Labour’s new housing policy – Shearer on Q+A

David Shearer on Q+A just set out new Labour policy on housing. I haven’t found a write-up yet, but from what I can gather:
• there will be restrictions on non New Zealanders buying houses in NZ
• Australians will be exempt (because of reciprocal arrangements there)

Most countries, including large Asian countries, have such restrictions in place themselves, Shearer was careful to emphasise that Labour would simply put in place policy in NZ that reciprocates.

This policy won’t cure our housing woes, but combined with KiwiBuild to increase supply, and capital gains tax to dampen speculation – it will go a long way to help.

On the panel discussion afterwards Bryce Edwards (in pillock mode) did his best to portray this as a racist policy – Shearer’s “Orewa moment” – I was glad to see Matt McCarten rubbish this nonsense, as it deserved. There was discussion of leadership issues of course, but the consensus was that at the very least this policy would buy Shearer more time, and all panelists gave Shearer good marks on his presentation and argument in this interview.

Labour will restrict the ability of non-residents to purchase New Zealand houses, as part of its comprehensive package of policies to help New Zealanders get into their first home.

“I will restore the Kiwi dream of home ownership that has slipped out of reach for tens of thousands of Kiwis. I don’t want to see our kids become a generation of renters,” says Labour Leader David Shearer.

“House prices in Auckland have risen by 28 per cent since June 2009. The problem is clear – there are just not enough affordable homes. And overseas speculators are adding to the problem.

“That’s why the next Labour government will introduce restrictions so that non-residents will not be allowed to buy any existing house, flat or apartment.

“Many other countries, including Australia, China, Singapore, the UK and Switzerland target overseas speculation in housing. New Zealand’s lack of regulation leaves the door wide open for international speculators.

“IRD records show that more than 11,000 overseas investors own properties here that they don’t live in. An estimated 2,600 homes were bought last year by offshore property speculators that had no intention of living here. That’s a big chunk, given that just 4,700 new homes were built in Auckland last year.

“This policy will reduce demand and help take some of the heat out of the market. It will put Kiwi buyers at the front of the queue.

“By itself this is not a silver bullet for housing affordability – but it is part of the solution.

“It sits alongside Labour’s KiwiBuild policy to build 100,000 affordable homes over 10 years for first time buyers, and our plan to tax property speculation. Together these policies will increase the supply of entry-level housing and reduce speculation-driven demand.

“Labour’s comprehensive housing affordability plan will mean first home buyers get a fair crack at getting into the housing market,” says David Shearer.

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702 comments on “Labour’s new housing policy – Shearer on Q+A”

A really important policy, this will help increase supply of housing by reducing demand. I understand by 5% to 10%, that seems like a lot. This combined with Capital Gains Tax will help with housing affordability.

The next policy that Labour needs to investigate is the interest deductibility of investment housing.

i doubt that Labour or anyone else will go anywhere near ‘interest deductibility’ from rental investments, much of the ‘investment’ in rentals was fueled off of the back of being able to deduct mortgage interest from ‘rental investments’ from personal taxation,

If your looking for a plan to shoe-horn those in the middle-class into ‘hone ownership’ that they currently find just out of reach then what Labour propose will serve to take some of the ‘heat’ out of particularly the Auckland housing market,

That’s as kind as i can bring myself to speak of such a ‘plan’, and, will finish by asking Labour the one question,

What of today’s ‘blue collar’, the workers who will never under this ‘affordability scheme’ be able to buy their own home,

What of today’s ‘blue collar’, the low waged workers consigned to pay ever higher rent’s for life, never having the means to save for ‘home ownership’ but shut out of State rentals by a huge demographic who’s fixed income makes them even more in need,

What of today’s ‘blue collar’ shut out of State rentals by what i am increasingly viewing as a deliberate rationing of ‘new build’ state housing to specifically address that ‘blue collars’ needs in favor of middle class home ownership schemes the beneficiaries of which will go onto to start a ‘portfolio’, saving for their retirement off of the sweat of that ‘blue collar’ trapped renting for life,

My view of Labour’s ‘housing policy, ‘oh luvly’ IF your a middle income child of the middle class on the verge of having enough savings to buy a first home,

For the ‘blue collar’ tho, the traditional vote of Labour ???, not a mention, nothing nada…

I can’t see the problem being touched at all until the state intervenes by means of a massive accommodation building program, whether for rent or assisted entry to buying. Tinkering with market mechanisms will not help. Real estate agents, developers, and tax lawyers will always find ways to work around market rules. Why is modern Labour so scared of the state doing anything for anyone except the middle class? On this, as with other issues, Mana is leading the way.

The ‘price’ of housing itself is only a part of the problem. The main problem is the sharing of income – as pointed out by Bryan Gould in the NZH today.

“As Treasury research shows, New Zealand households in the lower half of the income range had no increase in real incomes between 1988 and 2010; all the increase in national income over that period went, in other words, to those who were already better off. Although labour productivity in the private sector rose by 48 per cent over a similar period (1989 to 2011), the average hourly wage rose in real terms by only 14 per cent”

Yes, wages need to go up as well. My idea is that the government can price accommodation as a certain fraction of income, which would help in the meantime. We have a long fight ahead to get our country back.

Isn’t it amazing how the “experts” are waiting to drive holes through the proposal. One was heard to say on TV news tonight “What’s to stop a company listing on the stock exchange in order to purchase a portfolio of properties?”
And another suggested “People could buy through a proxy”
Sort of puts the stock exchange in a bad light, I would have thought. You have to also love the way conveyancing lawyers suggest loopholes would be found. Are these “experts” working for the good of New Zealand or the overseas speculators.

Perhaps they could be seconded to help write watertight law to prevent the loopholes.

Great Depression – Top Five Causes of the Great Depression
americanhistory.about.com/…/greatdepression/…/greatdepressio…‎
by Martin Kelly – in 41 Google+ circles
What were the top causes of the Great Depression in the United States? Here is a list of the top five causes of the Great Depression.

The simple fact that gets passed by is that the policy settings of the world prior to the Great Depression were pretty much what we have now. There were some differences of course but there’s a very good reason as to why modern economic theory is called neo-classical. It’s because we’ve used it before and it didn’t work then either.

srylands every one else is doing it except our stupid economy so we are putting ourselves at a dis advantage!
so we are mugs is what your actually saying!
News none of these economies are going to give up their advantage in our lifetimes!
Why strategically it doesn’t make any sense if war was to break out these economies you have listed would be an easy target of invasion as they would not be able to sustain a war!
fact of life for dumb naive F/wits!
When you look at other non direct subsidies you will find those figures change dramatically ie capitol gains taxes research & development subsidies marketing subsidies!
Your just plain naive srylands go back to KB !

This is good policy and needed. But its also piecemeal: it does nothing to address banks fuelling spiralling house prices with debt, to move growth from Auckland to other regional centres, to stop people collecting portfolios of 5, 10, 15 houses.

Auckland’s population is projected to grow at 30,000-35,000 per year if nothing else changes. Anyone who does the math will see that massive steps are required.

The other thing is that Labour needs to create an insightful narrative that people can buy into. The press release explains the problem using completely circular logic. Need to do much better.

The problem is clear – there are just not enough affordable homes.

You see, that’s not the problem. That’s just the symptom. And stating the symptom does not reveal anything new.

Exactly.
Servicing a 300,000 mortgage (with kiwbank) over 25 years, is currently 22,334 per year (not much less than the annual minimum wage) or about $430 per week. A 400,000 mortgage would cost $573 per week, almost exactly the minimum wage.

I still see a fairly large gap. House prices can be moderated by increasing land supply. There is no short term solution on wage levels. It requires an increase in national income. You can’t just dial up higher living standards via Government regulation.

Anyway most people on minimum wages don’t stay there forever. Students working at supermarkets earn min wage. They then go on to become high income earners. Why on earth do we care?

For those on persistently low incomes we should top them up via the tax and welfare systems, esp. for those with kids – hence WFF. I think the Government also has a role in discouraging low income earners from having large families – i.e a one child policy. But I am getting off topic.

Remember that a factor in the GFC was subprime lending for housing for folks that just could not afford it – that won’t be repeated here. But it does mean that for the bottom income earners we need to be realistic that quality welfare housing is what they are going to get. They are not going to service $300,000 mortgages. Even if NZ adopts more aggressive pro growth policies (and I dont see that happening) those kinds of incomes are 20 years away. So we should be thinking about policies that will get the children of current low income earners into housing in 2040.

Anyway most people on minimum wages don’t stay there forever. Students working at supermarkets earn min wage. They then go on to become high income earners. Why on earth do we care?

That, right there, is why you’re a dick. What about the people who do stay at or near minimum wage? Not every person on minimum wage will be a high income earner. That is why we should care. And nobody has mentioned a short term solution, just that we should look for a solution.

Similarly, an average household price of $300k does not mean that some houses or apartments will be less than $300k.

I think the Government also has a role in discouraging low income earners from having large families – i.e a one child policy.

Oh, fuck off. You don’t want the government in markets, but you want them inside people’s pants. Despicable.

No they can’t. Sprawl costs more so the few thousand saved by increasing land availability is quickly eaten up in transport costs and increased rates. Also, what happens when we fully run out of available land?

There is no short term solution on wage levels.

It’s a better solution than making people poorer as you’ve suggested we do.

It requires an increase in national income.

We';ve been doing that for the last 30 years and it’s not working. The people at the bottom have been getting poorer while a few sociopaths at the top get richer.

Anyway most people on minimum wages don’t stay there forever. Students working at supermarkets earn min wage. They then go on to become high income earners.

Ah, the illusion of social mobility. It doesn’t happen anywhere near as much as you’d like to think.

For those on persistently low incomes we should top them up via the tax and welfare systems, esp. for those with kids – hence WFF.

And you’ll whinge about that as well. But here’s a question: Why can’t the businesses actually pay a living wage instead of demanding government subsidies?

Even if NZ adopts more aggressive pro growth policies (and I dont see that happening) those kinds of incomes are 20 years away.

Actually, such wages for the presently low paid will never eventuate in the present system as proved by the fact that the present system has failed to supply them. No amount of growth will do so while the majority of the money goes to the few at the top. The only way to do it is a more equal distribution of wealth.

So we should be thinking about policies that will get the children of current low income earners into housing in 2040.

Which is pretty much what the idiots have been saying since Plato’s day, We can’t do it now, we’ll have to do it tomorrow and, of course, tomorrow never comes.

We do support Loan to Value Ratios…we’ve been calling for them for ages, as part of reforming monetary policy. We just think that to implement them now, in the middle of a housing crisis caused by the Government’s failure to build new affordable homes or tax speculators, is putting far too much weight on LVRs as a tool and will shut out first home buyers. Which is why we are calling for a temporary exemption for first home buyers, while other measures kick in (Kiwibuild and Capital Gains Tax).

Phil I brought might house in Auckland 8 years ago in a run down suburb worked my arse off went hungry but feed the kids and now it’s worth 700k plus and did it on 65k. I have a great life and great family home. Now you want to destroy my life achievement …tell your bribe policy advisors to buy houses they can afford not what they desire. Thanks once a labour voter now gone. Stuff you for not thinking about the people who work hard. Soft soft soft

I’m glad the Kiwi dream worked out for you. It did for me too, I bought in the 80s, but sadly a whole generation of Kiwis are pretty much locked out right because of the huge untaxed capital gains made by those who have owned property over the last 30 years. It is not sustainable – not financially (which is why the Reserve Bank is so worried about the property bubble bursting) and not socially (given that younger and lower income NZers have no chance of owning their own home). It is time we did something different. We need to make houses more affordable – even if that means you cannot rely on the rate of capital gain you and I have been enjoying. And we need an economic policy that focuses more on jobs, and better jobs so that we can reverse the growing inequality and poverty that is a big part of what is making houses so unaffordable.

Phil, people need to get a grip and start at the bottom of the property ladder. Just because you’ve been to Uni or got a Macca’s job doesn’t mean you are entitled to a Mcmansion. Just checked on Realestate.com and there are 51 pages of houses under $300,000 in the Wellington region. Got to be affordable if you are prepared to live in Wainui, Titahi Bay or in a 2 bedroom Wgtn apartment. We did that as did my brothers and sisters and now live quite comfortably in more up market suburbs. Two incomes even on relatively low wages will get you what you want and you may even find that the community spirit in some of the less affluent suburbs will give you a great lifestyle. You get out of life what you put into it.

In Auckland you can find houses in those price ranges as well. They tend to require a expensive daily commute of two-three hours for most people and the maintenance of several vehicles.

In case you hadn’t picked up on it, Wellington doesn’t have the problems with housing that Auckland and Christcurch currently have. So mouthing platitudes from a area without much work outside of the corporate headquarters and government to people that work in businesses isn’t exactly convincing.

Perhaps it’d be better if those dicks in Wellington would stop getting between Aucklanders and a decent public transport system. But that won’t happen until at least 2020 according to this government…

Most of the housing shortage is concentrated in Auckland and Christchurch. Those are the places where a shortage of apartments and houses is causing the sharpest rise in costs.

So your point is? That we should look at Te Awamutu or Westport with ample and relatively cheap housing and no significant job creation to define the housing in NZ. Personally I’d prefer that to be the case myself.

However governments should be dealing with the reality of the current rather than living in Nationals fantasy fairyland that opening up greenfields on the outside of city will do anything.

But I live in the centre of Auckland city. This current job is the first one since I moved into my apartment in 1998 that is near the centre of the city. I have worked everywhere from Manakau to Albany. I live here because a commute from Browns Bay to Onehunga (like one friend does) every workday is intolerable.

You brought a house in a run down suburb and managed to do it on only 65k. Wow, what hardship you must have endured. You might be interested to know that 65k per annum would have put you easily in the top 10% of incomes. So if you had to buy in a run down suburb, worked your arse off and went hungry, imagine what it’s like for the other 90% of the population…

I don’t bullshit. He didn’t say household income so why would I assume that. You know what they say about assumption, which is what you have done and low and behold, the poster has confirmed later in this thread that his wages were 65k you fool.

Regardless, average household income means nothing, the median is far more helpful.

Will there was a 30% devaluation crash after the last bust..so I actually had more risk …so is that hard work too?

Do you own a property?

With over 500 responses on here that tells me even labour supporters are struggling to understand this policy and whether it’s all confusing

[lprent: most of our commentators could only be described as Labour supporters if you have a drug induced imagination. The explanation is a lot simplier. It has been a while since there have been so many nutjob trolls to torment. They usually only show up when their pocket books are threatened or when Crosby-Textor are back in Wellington.

I see that Captain Panic Pants has a new role – providing room? And I detect a bit of the paid astroturfers. I may start doing some judicious pruning of the idiots with a volume commission providing quantity without quality if I detect them. ]

FC said “Now anyone that lives in Auckland knows that 375sqm is the subdivision size. Mine is 750 Sqm. Is the next step that labour makes me split my land by law. ”

Where, and PLEASE show a link was ANYTHING about introducing a law to make people subdivide their sections?.

Hmmmm. Me thinks that he doth protest too much, and if you did divide and build, then you would make yet another 700k or so. What are you ? the latest in a long line of ungrateful, money grubbing, Tory trolls?

…and banks suggesting 1st time buyers use the ‘Bank of Mum and Dad’, securing higher loans against equity in parent’s homes….I was recently asked to do this and as much a I’d like to help my kids into homes, by doing so I’d be only helping extend the problem

I watched the whole interview on Q & A. I’d have felt a lot happier if Shearer had taken a moment to state – unequivocally, no Winston language – that immigrants are not the target, will not be affected, and are an integral, welcome part of today’s New Zealand. Kill the xenophobia angle stone dead, right at the start. It was too fuzzy (deliberately? I hope not).

The policy may be OK in the details (yet to study), but it’s the presentation and perception that matter. I don’t have much confidence in Shearer’s ability to make this sound practical and principled rather than a half-baked Winston. We’ll see.

I don’t know exactly why, but it irks me when he says “I will… (make housing affordable for first home buyers, or do this or that or whatever when he is talking policy).”. More of the inclusive “we will…” would sound better to me.

He screwed up the soundbite on Radio NZ (just now). Talked about people “coming into New Zealand” … but the whole freaking point is that they DON’T come into New Zealand. That’s the crucial divide: speculator who never sets foot in the place versus immigrant/resident.

He is so linguistically deficient that he cannot make a basic point without giving a gift to his opponents.

Yep, that is the problem. It is Labour and the Lefts MAJOR problem, but to be fair to Shearer, it seems that most of the constituency also struggle with complexity so I do understand what Labour are trying to do here, trying to keep the message as simple as possible I guess.

“I watched the whole interview on Q & A.”
You did better than me the g! I usually can’t – except that today Chris Laidlaw was a bit wishy-washy.
I wish I hadn’t bothered. Susan Wood simply reminded me why I shouldn’t bother: her WASP Rothesy Bayness not ever quite enough to get to the bottom of the issue.
(disclaimer – I once lived on the edges of it.

– e.g. she didn’t bother to ask the Zespri CEO whether Pro-Forma invoices clearly indicated if they were just that, and did not clearly indicate that they might not represent the true value of goods OR how long and from when they were using them – I almost found myself agreeing with that -indepth, investigative foreskin of the business 4th Estate affectionately known as Fran.
– and watching Bryce Edwards was like watching an exercise in how the Muddle Class, when ‘comfort’ kicks in, become less questioning, less empathetic, less community aware & more ‘self’-aware.

I’m wondering when it was that a 5-7 minute ‘in-depth’ interview became the norm in supposedly holding people to account followed by the same or more length of time with boffins pontificating.

Pro Forma invoicing is illegal in Europe as it denotes fraud, hmmm…. allowed in NZ?

I don’t watch the program anymore, Susan Ward is not worth going through agony. She is biased and one can almost get the feeling that she has one eye on the paymaster whether she overstepped the mark. How can that be mistaken for an interviewer looking for some clear and truthful comments?

Why do we always need to rely on overseas funding sources and overseas ownership of our assets?

We don’t. In fact, no country does as the resources already belong to them and basic education will see to those resources being utilised. No, the only reason I can see for foreign ownership is that it’s a way for the worlds wealthy to increase their rental income and political power. It’s always bad for the country that allows it.

Overseas investment is a euphemisms for overseas debt.A significant number of multinationals create a NZ subsidiary lend the equity as debt, decreasing its taxation liabilities to single figures.This is seen in the electricity distribution companies.

No international investment in forestry and mines (oil and gas as well?). Well, that is really going to help the NZ economy.

Yep, it will. We have no need of foreign money to utilise resources we already own. The government just needs to create the money, spend it into the economy where needed and slightly raise taxes to take the money back out. This will develop our economy in ways that no foreign ownership can or will ever do.

Why not also say “no” to international banks, and “no” to international investment in manufacturing.

In fact, lets close the whole economy off from international investment.

Great idea.

Mind you I don’t expect that we would sell much overseas.

Don’t need to but nothing said yet has any restrictions on trade.

Even Labour has said international investment in farming is OK, if it has a demonstrable trade or innovation impact. On that basis Crafar farms would probably pass the test.

That’s because Labour, just like National, are still wedded to the delusional free-market paradigm that’s seen massive increases in poverty in NZ while a few got very much richer. And, no, the Crafar farm sales wouldn’t pass that test as it’s still NZers doing everything. All that happens is that the foreign owners now get an unearned income from NZ workers.

…breach our international commitments under the WTO and a raft of bilateral and regional agreements?

Ah no. All those agreements has opt-out clauses for anything that is defined as being of strategic importance. For instance our agreement with the chinese, with the aussies, and even with the WTO.

Any diplomat that manages to sign agreements without such devices to deal with the unexpected will traditionally be strung up and sent to console at a hot humid country with ample mosquitos. Or Wellington… Of course MFAT has been so castrated after dealing with McCully that they probably don’t have that tradition any more.

Personally, I’d like to see a 4% p.a. land tax applied to all land in NZ (excluding the family home). It would have an immediate effect on land values in NZ, and would raise a decent amount of income to fund social programs.

Rural farmland already has strong limits on non-resident ownership, under Labour’s policy. There is a similar underlying rationale – there is little or no benefit to NZ or New Zealanders putting farmland or homes into a global marketplace.

Rubbish, Auckland’s ‘problem’ is that as we artificially used immigration to ramp up the population from 3.3 million to 4.4 million in a compressed 20 year period when considered against the time frame it took for that population to get to 3.3 million,

The biggest % of that immigration has settled in the Auckland area and the population there has been further boosted by internal migration to that city,

Building records show that at this point the market failed, the demand for housing began to far out-weigh the supply NOT because of land availability issues but because the building industry first failed to ‘see’ the demand and second was unprepared to cope in terms of having the ability and man-power available to meet such a demand,

National can ‘open up’ the whole of the upper North Island from Waikato to Auckland to allow suburbanization of everything and this will make not one iota of difference because there is still not a sufficiently trained workforce that could build enough houses to match the ongoing demand…

One of the main problems is that we still build houses with the same mindset and construction methods that we did 100 years ago. If we wanted we could be building green, safe, dry & efficient housing for a quarter of the price or less – and installing it in a week or two.

If we were we’d have warm dry housing as the standards of 100 years ago were still built to the environment that England has to withstand. A lot of immigrants from northern climes say that our houses are cold and drafty.

Our governments have been minimising standards instead of maximising them and thus decreasing the quality of our housing and any drive to boost innovation in building better houses.

A customer of mine has just built a dome house in Ruakaka. Had a bit of trouble getting it past council but got there in the end. They make it out of a type of concrete sprayed on to an infated dome. As they’re spaying the concrete they run a coil of alkathene pipe through it to help with the hot water. This system is becoming a lot more efficient due to improvements in the inflatable bag giving vertical walls and then a domed roof. I’ve been in the house when it was finished. Absolutely brilliant! Warm, cozy, no need for a heater and virtualy free hot water. This is in the middle of winter which contrary to popular belief isn’t that flash up here. The good news is these houses are earthquake proof, hurricane proof, fire proof well insulated and cost about a third of a normal house. Admittedly they aren’t for everyone, but they would be great for low cost initial housing. Google monolith housing if you want more info.

The approach is largely the same. There has been shitloads of innovation in housing by architects, scientists and engineers but we still go for inefficient, resource and man-power intensive, bespoke builds. There are constant solutions to social housing being offered up but they are largely ignored in favour of the status quo.

I’d liken our current approach to that of building more motorways to solve congestion…

Yes! A lack of apprenticeships, other training opportunities and low wages has ensured that there aren’t enough tradesmen available to build the 13,000 houses required each year in Auckland alone. Even with legislative changes to open up more land and fast track the consent process (which helped cause the leaky building in the first place) there will still be a shortfall of 10,000 houses per year. That’s 10,000 families that will have to live in overcrowded accommodation, move out of Auckland or become homeless, so the issue is pretty serious.

However, it’s also the cost of materials being far more expensive in New Zealand compared to other countries like Australia. Even though we have an abundance of supply, much of what we produce is shipped overseas and the products that remain are overpriced because of a lack of competition. In my opinion, the government needs to also look at ensuring material costs are reduced as well as increasing training initiatives. You simply won’t build enough houses by relying on the “free” market or importing the workforce required. That simply means more funds going offshore. You do achieve the building of enough houses by removing natural monopolies and moving the unemployed into well payed jobs, whereby they can hope to save for a deposit.

In regards to National’s response to Labour’s latest housing policy announcement, I think they will do their best to ignore it. Like it or not, such a policy will find support from many National voters, not because it’s racist, but because it’s what’s required. The government must move to reduce inflationary pressure on the housing market, not just because it will mean more New Zealander’s will become first time home owners, but because without an effective strategy those who have already invested are likely to lose their savings when the bubble bursts. Without such measures, there will undoubtedly be a collapse that will not result in more affordable housing.

I think Labour should be commended for this initiative and clearly David Shearer’s performance on Q+A should not be criticized. In fact it was exemplary and without fault. Anybody who says otherwise is either a deluded fool or has ulterior motives.

Nothing National is doing will reduce the price of houses. All the arguments from National are of the “free the rules up on subdivision and it will reduce the cost of the land” type. Unfortunately for this argument there is considerable land which has consent and/or which the owners are quite happy to sit on – its called land banking. If you can afford to you will make lore money when demand rises, so you don’t develop the land you could develop now.
It is not in a developer’s interest to build cheap houses. Private developers will always build the largest (= most expensive) house they can construct on any single piece of land. A government requirement for a house built to a price is far more likely to build a cheap house than any developer that is producing houses on spec today.

Prices will only come down with:
– a capital gains tax; and,
– a large government funded cheap housing scheme.

Will either of these policies be carried out by the Nats? Of course not. Neo-liberalism cannot provide housing for all in a population, it is a philosophy that must produce homelessness and destitution for some.

It doesn’t take a greenie to realise the only way people on middle income or lower can afford to buy a a house in the next decade is with a Labour/Green government.

Good to see but Shearer needs to be more emphatic regarding spying legislation and freedom of access to information. To date he has not been firm in his opposition to Nationals draconian measures.

I also don’t understand why he has not exploded much of the lies National has told. Many of them are utterly transparent and easy to disprove: levels of unemployment, state of the economy, health coverage. All he needs to do is get hold of official stats under freedom of information and then start asking questions about how that information is measured.

Very good policy – unfortunately, one soft five minute interview does not a Prime Minister make – A tough interview will see David Shearer crumble once again. He just doesn’t have the fire in his belly to make people believe he could be a Prime Minister. He just doesn’t have enough conviction about anything. He always seems to be running on about 20 per cent power. And as usual, he’s BORING!!

Yes I agree. Shearer’s just not tough enough, nor does he seem to be that politically astute, not a failing in itself unless you want to become PM. He needs to put the boot into Keys, not really much of a challenge as much of what Keys has said is easy to disprove and yet, nothing. Time to use the ammunition offered by National to good effect David.

When will most Labour supporters realise Shearer is not PM material? Too soft and unable to explain things or come across clearly.
He has to be rolled before is too late and the damage too grave. Now is the time to bring a new leader: Robertson or Cunliffe?

He just doesn’t have the fire in his belly to make people believe he could be a Prime Minister. He just doesn’t have enough conviction about anything. He always seems to be running on about 20 per cent power.

That’s because he is someone on the slow down towards the end of his career, not accelerating towards the peak. You cannot hide something like that. After his years at the UN I’m unsure why he hasn’t decided to semi-retire, and take a couple of plum corporate or NGO board of director roles.

“Why isn’t Labour’s rank and file forcing the issue? How does the old guard (Mallard, King, Cosgrove) keep controlling the process? What will happen next?”

If you can tell me how to force the issue I will gladly do it. The old guard have safe seats and or top list rankings and can’t be ousted from parliament. The smaller the caucus gets, the higher the ratio of old guard to “young and aggressive.” Some old guard hang on because they can’t get another job that will pay as well as their MP salaries.

What will happen next is Labour will have another humiliating defeat in 2014. PM Key will be succeeded by PM Judith Collins. It’s a nightmare!

A wee bit agist, there, CV? I am sure there are a few older politicians who could show that there is still some fire in the belly at the advanced age of fifty plus. A bit of wisdom and a bit of residual youthful rage, an understanding of how the world works, of what (and who) can be changed or not changed, what is worth preserving and what is eternal against what is fashion and ephemeral; I’d say that a good career is fine training for leadership of a country.

What I tried to say, CV, was that in a whole list of what makes a good leader there is wisdom, fire in the belly, understanding, values and also a good career which should have used, taught and built up these qualities.

I would reply to your claim of “ageism is just a distraction made against me” is that your and others’ introduction of ABC (another bloody cavil) at Shearer when the thread is concerned with Labour Party policy is in itself a large distraction from a major announcement of policy on housing.

I am growing rather tired of this continual carping, cavilling, constant criticism against Shearer, especially when every pretext is taken to promote this view even when at best incidental to the main issue of the post.

I object also when an unfair and cynical use of ageism- saying Shearer’s past it and should be pensioned off with a token directorship or two- is used.

FFS, CV, we know your views on this subject. As my old science teacher used to say about unwanted interruption- “Keep it down to a dull roar, boys!”

I object also when an unfair and cynical use of ageism- saying Shearer’s past it and should be pensioned off with a token directorship or two- is used.

Oh bullshit mate. I gave you examples of two politicians, Churchill and Savage, who did their absolute best work in their mid 60’s.

Now you may think that Shearer is still strongly building up to his career zenith. Good on you. I disagree.

I am growing rather tired of this continual carping, cavilling, constant criticism against Shearer, especially when every pretext is taken to promote this view even when at best incidental to the main issue of the post.

I was simply replying to HS. Again, if you think that Shearer is proving himself as the Leader that Labour needs, good for you. You might note that several commentators above disagree, not just me. Protip: if you don’t like what others are saying on the internet, don’t read it.

“Oh bullshit mate. I gave you examples of two politicians, Churchill and Savage, who did their absolute best work in their mid 60′s.’

Only after I called you on it. What I would appreciate is some evidence that Shearer is not still strongly building up; I assume that being leader of the second strongest party in New Zealand is an increase on his old UN job, and that being a prospective PM would be even more so. My understanding from recent showings is that Shearer is improving his speaking skills and his recent outings at the Auckland rally and on Q and A are examples of this.

My protip: repetition ad nauseam is simply that- nauseous, and self-defeating, as the time comes when one turns over from being an astute commentator to one who is seen as being too much focussed on one issue that boredom, predictability and ultimately turn-off happens.

I’ve been long enough in the NZLP to know what single issue nutters look like, and I think you are far too smart to want to be seen as one of those. Generally, I have much respect for what you write.

“Oh bullshit mate. I gave you examples of two politicians, Churchill and Savage, who did their absolute best work in their mid 60′s.’

Only after I called you on it.

Which was a diversion on your part to start with. Age wasn’t a factor in my call; it was a factor in yours.

What I would appreciate is some evidence that Shearer is not still strongly building up

I take it back; there are no valid questions over his recent greatly improved perfomance as Labour Leader.

My understanding from recent showings is that Shearer is improving his speaking skills and his recent outings at the Auckland rally and on Q and A are examples of this.

It’s good you appreciate the importance of learning the basics on the job.

I’ve been long enough in the NZLP to know what single issue nutters look like, and I think you are far too smart to want to be seen as one of those. Generally, I have much respect for what you write.

Mate, I hope it all pans out the way you want, and that Shearer is the excellent Leader that you seem to see him as.

And why are you directing all your attention at me? Half a dozen other commentators above made similar remarks about Shearer (including Sable, CGE, Ama, etc). Yet you only focus on me without responding to any others. Something personal?

Don’t know you, CV. I don’t praise people against whom I have something personal. I reacted to what I saw as an attack on Shearer based solely on his age, above at 8.4. To that I responded because it seemed neither substantiated nor fair.

You’re right though that there is too much to focus on, regarding remarks made on Shearer, which is my other point.

“An estimated 2,600 homes were bought last year by offshore property speculators that had no intention of living here. That’s a big chunk, given that just 4,700 new homes were built in Auckland last year.” these 2,600 homes are not necessarily new and there is no evidence that these were all purchased in Auckland from the quote. from the link above that 74,000 homes were sold this is only 3.5% of all sales !!!
Also as the GCT was to assist in funding the $5k tax free threshold and GST being removed from F&V what will this windfall finance ? Perhaps recapitalise the EQC fund.
As an aside of the stupidity of the Auckland market here is a recent case in greater Botany.
220m2 home B&T on 700m2 Built 1997. Originally sold approx $300k resold in 08 680k recently sold in the last few months $930+k. Est cost to rebuild $450-$475k. the market maybe beyond saving, but I am sure that we WILL save the banks should the bubble burst.

Good points, probably across the whole country there are 10,000 new home buyers in any year, Labour propose to shut out ‘non -resident property investors’ and that’s all well and good as such investors are simply speculating,

Suggesting to Labour that the most effective fix for ALL the issues surrounding affordable housing is the same ‘fix’ that the first Labour Government and the others to follow used is pretty much futile as Shearer and Labour will live or die electorally on it’s present ‘flagship policy’,

10,000 State rentals built in the Auckland City boundary and specifically targeted to Low Income WORKING Families would kill off the demand in the Auckland market immediately and by dint kill off immediately the house price over-inflation in that Auckland market,

Neo-Liberalism is based around ‘picking winners’, Labour’s flagship housing policy picks the winners to be the children of the middle class and tells low income working families to go sing for a crust…

That’s a big chunk, given that just 4,700 new homes were built in Auckland last year.”

Auckland population likely to go from 1.50M in 2012 to at least 1.84M in 2025 (latter figure pulled from Auckland Transport Blog). That’s between 26,000 and 27,000 population growth per year.

As you say, in terms of a solution the math just doesn’t add up. 4,700 new homes a year doesn’t get anywhere close to the numbers required to sustain this growth, not by a long shot (unless of course we end up cramming 4 to 8 people in each new home built).

I am not convinced, and my reason for not being convinced is this: whenever David Shearer is on the ropes he feints to the left, which of course shows up the difficulties he faces where he tries to follow Armstrong’s advice and ignore his left wing critics.

Firstly, there was the leadership road-show. When it had become clear that Cunliffe was the favourite with the members, he jumped into his slipstream, purporting to hold much the same views. Having gained the leadership, he then came out with his roof painter speech, the reception of which forced him to put in an ambivalent appearance at the POAL picket. The first draft of the housing policy emerged at the conference, where he feared that his opponents would outnumber his supporters. The electricity policy emerged in time to trump the Greens releasing theirs, followed by an assurance that there would be no further market interventions. Now, with leadership challenge murmurings going up a notch and static polls, he has been forced to share a stage with John Minto at the GCSB rally, and up the ante on his housing policy.

I will not be convinced so long as David Shearer continues to come up with piece-meal reactions to challenges, and avoids articulating, maintaining and defending a position that is consistent with Labour Party values.

Also why not allow overseas ownership of property. with 1 stipulation all profits accrued / earned incur tax at the same rate as companies. These properties can be recored as all offshore investment must be registered at the office of either the OIO or at LINZ with the ownership being offshore. To allow efficiency all property to incur a GCT or company tax with property that is resided in by the owner at say 5% and a CGT for other property at the level that Labour propose 15%. So all property transactions are recognized. Also that where Sales and Purchase contracts are assigned all these movements are recorded so that where property is passed on to a 2nd purchaser any assignment fees or markups are also picked up and the tax is collected.- But there are plenty out there that would be able to refine (should these ideas have some merit ) these ramblings.

So far, I don’t like the taste of this one. The whole ‘foreigners stealing our houses’ thing has been given lots of press in recent weeks and this feels like Shearer desperately jumping on the bandwagon at the last minute to try to save himself.

Having been around a few auctions in the last year for apartments, two out of three have been won by agents hanging on the phone for overseas buyers. By the sound of it, the agents were their property managers for their other properties.

These are some of the few affordable apartments that fitted Lyn’s budget. Sensibly she is wanting to get into her own property in case we ever break up or I manage to drop dead. Her latest thoughts appear to be ignoring Auckland.

“Sensibly she is wanting to get into her own property in case we ever break up or I manage to drop dead”

In the case of a break up, legally she’s entitled to 50% of your property (including the funds in any bank accounts). You can of course come to other agreements as long as each party is receiving independent legal advice.

In the case of you dropping dead, she’d have a claim of your assets, even if you had written her out of your will, she could contest it.

“Plan to bar foreign buyers. Real estate industry commentators are questioning whether Labour’s new policy to restrict foreign ownership of houses will work.” NZ Herald.
The corporate media fights for its owners’ interests.
“Property commentator Olly Newland said the policy would not work.”
No critical look at why real estate insiders might have a vested interest in this policy not working.
This is his own bio on this website.http://www.ollynewland.co.nz/about-us/bio-olly-newland/
“Olly Newland was born in Lower Hutt, grew up in Plimmerton, then Karori, Wellington and, as a teenager, in Auckland, New Zealand.In his books, The Coming Property Boom (1978), The Property Boom (1981), and Lost Property (1994, updated 2001, 2007) he correctly foresaw many of the coming market events. His The Rascal’s Guide to Real Estate (2002) is a real-world handbook for today’s property investor and in his book, The Day the Bubble Bursts this supremely experienced investor and dealmaker alerts investors about a coming market transition and gives advice about how to make the most of opportunities coming. Climbing the Property Ladder recounts some of Olly’s adventures as an investor.

This is stupid policy. The problem in New Zealand is not enough zoned land supply. We need less restrictions on foreign investment. New Zealand has a current account deficit. That needs to be funded through borrowing or capital inflows. If you reduce capital inflows for housing, you will need to INCREASE capital inflows for something else OR increase borrowing OR reduce living standards.

Aside from the basic economics being totally wrong, the ban on foreigners is easy to get around (just like it is easy to get around in Bali – foreigners can’t own houses there either, but many do – they do so through local nominees. You think that won’t happen here?

This is just xenophobic populism (Foreigners are stealing our houses) next it will be “foreigners are stealing our jobs”. This is what you expect from NZ First because there is an ignorant underclass that laps it up. But at least in the last 30 years we should expect more from Labour. New Zealand deserves better in an Opposition.

Land supply is limited and no amount of zoning will change that. Also, suburban sprawl costs more than building cities upwards.

We need less restrictions on foreign investment.

Actually, we need to ban foreign investment so that NZ’s economy can work for NZers rather than the foreign owners as it does now.

If you reduce capital inflows for housing, you will need to INCREASE capital inflows for something else OR increase borrowing OR reduce living standards.

BS, we have no need of foreign money at all.

Aside from the basic economics being totally wrong, the ban on foreigners is easy to get around (just like it is easy to get around in Bali – foreigners can’t own houses there either, but many do – they do so through local nominees. You think that won’t happen here?

I’m sure that it will be tried, I’m also sure that laws can be put in place to stop it. One I’d suggest is that if such local nominees exist the house and land will be nationalised without compensation and the local nominee will spend a great deal of time in jail.

This is just xenophobic populism

Ah, the usual right-wing meme of xenophobia which they always pull out of their arse when their preferred way of screwing over NZers is threatened.

North Korea’s problems stem from it’s dictatorial system, not it’s monetary system (although that probably has something to do with it as well). As we see increasing dictatorial systems in the Western World (caused by ever increasing accumulation in the hands of the few) we see the same problems happening here.

Sorry but your rantings are those of a complete nut job.

You’re not sorry at all so stop lying and as you’re the one who’s provided no argument it’s your rantings that are those of a complete nut job.

We have a current account deficit which is basically just to pay off the loans we have got from overseas money-lenders and to pay the dividends on shares owned by foreign investors.

If we didn’t borrow any money for a few years, and nationalised those companies with high foreign ownership, we would have no current account deficit. Simple.

Any one arguing that we don’t have enough land zoned for housing hasn’t looked closely at what is zoned for housing and then looked at which parts haven’t been developed. My guess is the majority of the undeveloped Residential zoned land is owned by National supporters. If we nationalised all undeveloped Residential zoned land in the Auckland Council area and had it all developed by a government housing department in town-house/terrace housing style, then the whole housing issue would go away (except for those persons who paid top dollar for their house before the market deflated) because the demand for housing was being met by the government on the existing Residential zoned land.

No we can’t do that. CER with Australia prevents it for a start. (I’m not sure about the other bilateral trade agreements – you might want to check) So all a foreigner needs to do is establish an AUSTRALIAN company to so the trust buying in NZ. Problem solved.

So I assure you it is not incredibly easier to administer. It would be impracticable.

Not that hard to administer. Purchaser’s solicitor has to declare at sale that purchaser is a NZ citizen or resident. If company or trust has 25% or more non-resident holding then it gets caught. (Same principle as currently in Overseas Investment Act.)

Let foreign owned companies operate as commented above let them pay tax on all capital gains and enforce how these entities are funded related party finance arrangements eg how the banks were recently done for complexed tax arrangementsfor trusts stipulate who is residing eg benefactor or tenanted all these issues are easily fixed with a clear understanding of what is to be achieved and that there will always be some who find loopholes nothing will be 100% accept this and KISS

Do any of your friends obey the laws of the countries they live in, sorryhands? I’m starting to rethink my availability for your employment position. Can you assure me that you obey all the industrial and taxation laws relevant to your business? I don’t want to get mixed up in anything dodgy.

Sooo… If foreigners can’t buy houses, they will be renting them instead. This is going to push up the price of rentals, pushing tenants out of the market. Its the unintended consequences that get you every time.

Well there is a bit of that and I’m not going to disagree with you. I have already said that a real plan needs to be much more comprehensive. It also has to deal with increasing the median income, not just reducing house prices.

Probably not much – because it would never be well-reported in the media and the likes of Gower would pick the worst possible aspects to promote, making it look like they were the only things in the policy. Then Farrar would find some catchy rhyming slogan to sum it all up and the press would reprint it accordingly.

Not that I think this is a reason not to pursue such a policy, I just think we’ve got a very disengaged population, especially among the better-off middle classes, and we don’t have a Labour Party with the strategic/media/communications nous to work the system well.

Labour have stated that it is only a small part of the broader policies aimed at cooling the housing market so your problem definition is a)Not a problem definition for starters and b) even if it was, it would be incorrect, as it is simply one of the many contributing factors that have created the problem, as opposed to the problem itself.

The problem definition would be something like “Buying a home has become unaffordable for a large percentage of New Zealand residents”

Regardless, if it contributes to the problem, no matter to what extent, why wouldn’t you address it? What are the negatives for ordinary Kiwis in implementing this policy? I can’t think of any at all for home buyers (Note, I said “home” buyers, not rent seekers.). If it reduces demand even by a fraction then surely that is still a good thing and a step in the right direction?

I can’t imagine why you would prefer non resident buyers to own houses in New Zealand rather than people living here. Oh, I guess you must be a rent seeker.

It’s a ban on foreign investors – you know foreign nationals who don’t reside in New Zealand. Could you please take the time to explain why corporations and high wealth individuals who are based overseas would want to rent houses here?

tsm absentee tenants i’m sure they will rent houses where they never intend to live or take up residency no capital gain their!DOH
tsm I think you have shot your self in the foot big time it must of been very hard as it was stuck in your big mouth!

Yes it would work just like it does in Indonesia – how many Kiwis own holiday homes in Bali despite the “ban” there on foreigners owning houses? I personally know two. (and they are magic places to go for a holiday – the kind of friends you want :-))

But seriously there is no way to enforce it without breaching our other obligations on the free movement of capital.

The holes in this policy are extremely substantial given that they make the policy effectively null and void.

The country’s books will be balanced by 2015 if the press is to be believed. Economic confidence is higher, consumer confidence is higher. By-and-large, the current policies are working for most NZ’ers

Maybe I need to read it all from the start again. I haven’t seen a so-called hole in this policy so far on this thread that someone else here hasn’t suggested a solution to. No one is suggesting it solves all NZ’s woes. And by and large the current housing situation is not working for a great many New Zealanders.

Yep! With BRANZ finding in 2011 that residential rentals were overpriced by 43% and the OECD finding that 59% of New Zealand houses aren’t being maintained properly plus an ever increasing divide since National gained power between incomes and house prices, perhaps housing should be the main issue leading up to the next election. Personally I’d really like to hear what exactly National will do to fix the problem instead of just trying to create a moral panic about Labour’s solutions.

Of course you can own property in Bali – where, unless you’re a citizen of Indonesia, you are not able by law to own any property in Indonesia. And then you pay.

You can of course for a fee use an Indonesian name holder to purchase property but every time you do anything to the property the name holder requires the fee to be paid again.And then you pay.

And then there’s the quaint practice called a right of use or right of building lease where the holder may erect and possess buildings for a period of time of not more than thirty years.And then you pay.

Anyhoo, good luck to your friends, they’re going to need it because those palm’s will multiply and every single one will need greasing at regular intervals.

What is notable is that in Europe it is the right wing extremists that want to “ban” things and who are xenophobic. In NZ it is the left.

When I visit other countries that put restrictions on the movement of people can capital it is a pain in the arse. Argentina is a good example. Its policies over the last 70 years have impoverished the country. Those polices have a strong common theme of “blame the foreigners”.

If NZ goes down this path it just makes it easier for other countries to engage in an arms race of restrictions. We should be encouraging global liberalisation around people and capital movement. So when New Zealanders go and visit and live in other countries they are as free as possible. Most New Zealanders choose to invest, visit, or live in other countries at some stage. We should be setting an example in our domestic policy settings.

What is notable is that in Europe it is the right wing extremists that want to “ban” things and who are xenophobic. In NZ it is the left.

No xenophobia here. As I said to you before, that is just a right-wing lie.

Its policies over the last 70 years have impoverished the country.

Yep, they have, it was the same policies that you espouse. They turned things around a bit over the last few years by getting rid of some of those policies.

Those polices have a strong common theme of “blame the foreigners”.

Yeah, that’s probably because the foreigners caused the poverty – just like they are in NZ. Of course, it was the policy settings that allowed the foreigners to cause that poverty that was the actual problem.

We should be encouraging global liberalisation around people and capital movement.

Nope. It may have worked back when we had only 500m people in the world and all immigration could easily be sustained by all areas easily, it is not practical when we have 7b and climbing and immigration into a country could, and probably would, push it into being unsustainable.

Most New Zealanders choose to invest, visit, or live in other countries at some stage.

BS, I think you’ll find that most NZers never even get out of the country.

Did you see the bit where it says “I think”? Here’s the thing, I can find out that about 60% of USians never leave the US with a simple Google search. I cannot find that information at all about NZ but given that the median wage is so low I’m figuring that it isn’t that much different. The majority of people quite simply cannot afford to.

Last I remember hearing 1/5 of New Zealanders lived somewhat permanently overseas and that isn’t taking into account those who travel for pleasure/holidays.

I agree that a citation is needed for “50% of NZers have an overseas holiday in any given year”, but according to wikipedia “New Zealand has a passport possession rate of around 75% of the population”, so I reckon the truth is somewhere between you guys – i.e. my guess is most to half of NZers go overseas once in their lives (if only to aus or the pacific islands), but but a large chunk would never use their passports except to get into the pub.

try putting links in. It would help people know what you are talking about (1.9mil – is that individuals, trips, or NZ individuals that we are interested in? I know a few individuals who take multiple trips each year to Aus or the pacific for work).

No I should be paying taxes where I am tax resident. Under your logic as NZ businesses expand into export of services (like I am doing) we should lose their tax revenue! Tax treaties simply are not constructed like that.

They pay a smaller proportion of their wealth in taxes than those less well-heeled. And they whinge about it more. The poor whinge about prices. The rich whinge about taxes. The poor can’t avoid the prices. The rich can avoid the taxes.

Beneficiaries or trustees reside in the property? No then commercial activity and tax it. Sure you don’t stop foreign ownership but then they contribute to the tax take. Refer to my comment 12:33above.
Next problem ?

Not so easy. We will look through trusts and companies to beneficial owner of the trust or shares. If 25% or more owned by non-residents then they will be caught. That is the percentage that triggers rules under the Overseas Investment Act currently, and the principle which we have adopted for our policy on rural land sales.

I completely reject this is anti-Chinese or xenophobic. You do yourself a disservice by suggesting this. More non-resident Brits buy homes here than Chinese do. Do you think this policy is racist against Brits? And since when is it xenophobic to have a policy that puts the interests of NZ and New Zealanders before overseas investors? Is it xenophobic to have a government procurement policy that gives NZ firms the first crack? Is it xenophobic to have an immigration policy that controls flow of immigrants?

Do you have any research or evidence to back up the claim that this policy will achieve much of an outcome for those struggling to purchase or is it a gut feeling? I assume Labour has some research to quantify how much his policy costs in compliance and how much it will lower housing costs, although they seem not to have produced anything yet. Or are we to trust our gut feel?i

It’s not protectionist because the government should take into account all economic effects with their purchases and not just price. And it’s not bad policy because it will benefit NZ. Unlike the policy that you espouse which we’ve tried for the last 3 decades and it’s made us worse off. That’s what all that poverty is that we never used to have and wouldn’t have now if we hadn’t followed the sociopathic policy prescriptions of the Washington Consensus and neo-liberalism.

Is it wrong for police to wear flak jackets?
Yes, it is protectionist. They must be open to all possibilities from every corner of the world.

We could also have a larger number of police for the same total cost, if we brought in men from overseas willing to serve here at much cheaper rates. Same with economists. Could be an improvement, mightn’t be worse. But we would be open to all etc………….

srylands Australian states and govt do it the US does it China Japan the EU Russia are all protecting their economies we are the odd ones out so we are damaging our economy for the sake of being perfectionist financial fanatics !
Free Markets are a misnomer a fantasy that the right follow blindly without question!

You just make it a legal requirement that any purchaser of existing residential property must be resident in New Zealand, including trusts. So a percentage (or all) who have holdings in the trust must be residents or they get pinged. Simple.

Why is it Chinese?? Please explain.

ps – Did you notice the fairly relevant terms in my first sentence? “Residential” and “Resident”. Funny that.

When some poor beneficiary bends the rules or tries to work a dodge you’ve no problem telling us how rotten and unfair this is. And when WINZ and IRD and other govt agencies run sophisticated data-matching schemes to catch them you’re happy to applaud their efforts.

But when it’s people with money and privilege rorting the system you just tell us “that’s how it is”.

The “poor beneficiaries” etc are generally being chased because authorities consider them to be acting illegally.

In contrast, those seeking to work around laws about purchasing properties in NZ would be using legal means to achieve their goals, therefore wouldn’t come to the attention of authorities. If they weren’t acting legally, though, then I would support them being hauled over the coals as well, just as with beneficiaries who collect benefits illegally or whatever.

In contrast, those seeking to work around laws about purchasing properties in NZ would be using legal means to achieve their goals, therefore wouldn’t come to the attention of authorities.

Once upon a time beneficiaries could get away with ‘working around the law’ because no-one bothered to check up on them too closely and they could fly under the radar.

If the government wanted to it would be relatively simple to impose the kind of data matching and checking to ensure most if not all overseas owners were sufficiently discouraged from trying to scam the system. You don’t have to make it water-tight, just complex and risky enough to make it not worth the effort.

This is how IRD works these days. If they deem your scheme to be ‘for the purposes of tax avoidance’ … they will dismantle it regardless of how ‘legal’ it might appear to be.

Yep, it’s complete shit and will be publicly ripped apart over the next few weeks.

Labour, once again will be made to look like complete clowns, really what sort of fecking idiot would vote for these ass hats, they’re not fit to run a corner shop dairy let alone a country of 4.5 million, fark.

That’s a pretty big problem then, Labour is going to get torn to shreds.

Unless Shearer suddenly has had a new brain inserted he’s going to end up looking even more dense than usual as he tries to make policy on the fly and ends up tripping over himself.
Really desperate stuff from the red camp.

Also, yeah a couple of first home buyers may think it’s great, but I’d say the other 1.5 million existing home owners won’t be too stoked with Labour fucking with their most valuable asset.
Gain a 1000 votes here, lose 10,000 vote there, dumb stuff.

Actually no. Most New Zealanders will see this as a sensible, commonplace and overdue policy change. They can see it is action over the ditch in Australia and can see for themselves that it’s hardly destroyed their housing market.

Indeed that very observation reinforces the point that restricting overseas ownership is only one relatively small part of an overall housing policy. It’s real value is that is signals to the electorate that Labour is serious about the problem.

After all while there are many kiwis who have benefitted from the housing bubble, they also have kids, family and relatives who have not. And this worries them. I’m in the same boat. While I’ve worked bloody hard and taken real risks to build a small portfolio over the last 13 yrs (from nothing I might add) … my daughter will never own her own home unless I help her somehow.

And while I had the pleasure of seeing some of our tenants over the years go on to buying their first home … there are others who precarious life and income situation will forever lock them out.

While there is a real and valid market for renting, for the majority of young couples or families it should be only a transitional phase. Increasingly we are seeing them get stuck renting and I don’t like it one bit.

Of course the left will get elected, if not next year then in four years time. The percentage of voters who are not able to afford to buy a home of their own is growing rapidly. Add that to the percentage of your existing home owners who actually care about other people and future generations and you’ll have an easy majority if not now then in the near future.

Abbott mentioned limiting NZers rights to work in Oz before the last election. If he is going to make a national emergency about 5k boat people trying to get in,, what do you think he is going to say about 70k kiwis turning up to work restriction free.

So why not just ban us from owning NZ property? As an Australian who inadvertently owns N Z property I have no quibble with what NZers want to do with land ownership. Thing is though, rents in Auckland are so high that selling at the moment would lose me a lot of income. I pay tax to both IRD and ATO so the amount of tax paid to NZ ( which isn’t much by the way) is irrelevant in the long run since I get it back via a tax credit. So an really confused as to why non Australians contribute more to speculation than us Australians. Is our money somehow different?

Will probably happen, banning NZers welfare in Australia is the first step towards dismantling the TTA and I can see Abbott giving NZers less incentive to move here after he finishes demonising other would be immigrants. As the wage gap between he 2 countries widens so will the call to ditch cooperation.

For decades New Zealand has been running a current account deficit due to ‘negative investment income’ flows out of the economy. In other words, overseas owners expatriating local profits back into their home countries. This roughly amounts to about 7-9% of GDP every year.

Now while the cash accounting of these transactions balances to zero, the value balance does not. Every year some 7-9% of the value of our economy is vacuumed out of it …. to benefit other people.

Of course if this were not counter-balanced in some fashion the value of our money supply would rapidly diminish towards zero. The counter-balancing force has been the four big Australian banks happily and profitably printing money into our housing market. This is what has kept us afloat … real value being sucked out at one end, while imaginary debt money is pumped in at the other.

Fiscally this is an unstable arrangement because eventually our ability to pay interest on the debt will be tapped out.

Equally it is a socially unstable arrangement because it has driven a massively unequal distribution of wealth. Those with property have captured most of the ‘pumping up’, while those without have simply missed out.

Since Shearer’s release is reproduced in full above, I thought it would be useful to post Norman’s response:

>>>

The Green Party today welcomed David Shearer’s announcement about restricting overseas buyers access to the New Zealand housing market.

“We welcome Labour getting on board with another Green Party solution that will make housing more affordable for New Zealanders,” said Green Party Co-leader Dr Russel Norman.

“This is a sensible measure that will help reduce demand and lower prices meaning more New Zealanders can own their own home.

“We were very pleased when Labour adopted our policy about a capital gains tax excluding the family home, and likewise we are pleased that Labour have got on board with this policy. This is about making housing affordable for New Zealand families.

“Housing shouldn’t be a place for speculators it is a place where people live.

“Many other countries like Australia, Hong Kong and Singapore have similar policies.

“Restrictions on overseas buyers are a good first step but by itself will not fix the problem.

“We need a suite of measures both to restrict speculation but also measures to help New Zealand families into their own home.

“Our Home for Life package delivers meaningful changes that will move more New Zealand families into an affordable home and provide better housing for those who rent,” said Dr Norman.

>>>

Personally, I’m glad we’re moving away from the orthodoxy of unrestricted markets, and glad Labour is making moves in this direction. Time will tell if this direction is sustained and goes deeply, or is limited and specific and only addresses certain issues such as housing.

George, thanks for the supportive comment and I hate to look a gift horse in the mouth, but I would have thought that using the Crown balance sheet to build 100,000 affordable homes, and legislating to make it mandatory for landlords to provide warm dry homes was pretty good evidence in a housing policy of a committed move away from hands off free market policies. Put that alongside a jobs and modern manufacturing policy that includes rewriting the Reserve Bank Act, a government procurement policy that puts Kiwi firms first, R&D tax credits, a Capital Gains Tax, and raising the top tax rate for >$150K. Add that to a commitment to do away with the Bradford electricity reforms and introduce a single buyer model, a promise not to sell any state assets, and a commitment to strengthening collective bargaining (rather than weakening it as National is doing). I know it won’t satisfy everyone at The Standard but policy-wise that all adds up in my view to a pretty decisive break with the old orthodoxy.

Hi Phil – only one additional thing: benefits should be returned to survivable levels, so that people can live in some decency until the job creating effects of those other policy initiatives can kick in.

Well I would back the Treasury over you knowing more about the likely impact of higher marginal tax rates on all positive economic indicators. What happens when the wealth leaves the country as a result? Or are you going to stop people leaving at the border and force them to stay and pay up?

Most of the commentators here are advocating a “ban” – the favourite word on foreigners owning assets here. Also I have read people openly advocating an end to free capital movements. Well the next logical step is to ban the free movement of people – simply stop New Zealanders leaving with their money. It would not surprise me.
_________

“Raising personal income tax, whether by fiscal drag, tax rate changes, or adding a
payroll tax, is likely to be very inefficient with adverse effects for labour force
participation and (except for the payroll tax) savings and investment.” The Treasury, January 2013

What happens when the wealth leaves the country as a result? Or are you going to stop people leaving at the border and force them to stay and pay up?

Let it go; more currency can always be issued.

“Raising personal income tax, whether by fiscal drag, tax rate changes, or adding a
payroll tax, is likely to be very inefficient with adverse effects for labour force
participation and (except for the payroll tax) savings and investment.” The Treasury, January 2013

To Srylands – you are in cuckoo-land. The policies Phil Twyford has just reminded you about are the very policies which will CREATE jobs for New Zealanders – not destroy them as this NAct govt is currently doing.

No they won’t. They will create a giant deadweight cost of taxation, drive the wealthy out of the country and do nothing to solve our core problem of low productivity.

You will find no serious economist in the world that would look at this package and say “snap” a package for job creation – wow lets have this – gee I’ll recommend this to my client governments – those smart people in NZ have the answers…

It is total madness. You only think it is normal on this blog because you are surrounded by like minded people that think the answer is “hands on” government and higher taxes.

Srylands it has cost this govt $200 million to save $20 on public servants.Civil servants cost a lot less than the droves of consultants national replace them with!
National party hacks and when they don’t agree with Nationals policy they get pushed aside
like Don Brash who at least had the guts to publish his findings on housing affordability!
Had brash continued his research would have shown up this govts policy settings right across the board1

Phil, Just pondering on this, in my view (and I have stated this often on TS), Labour has good policy, but it has 2 major problems 1) Shearer is absolutely hopeless, simply not up to it…I’m sure you know this and 2) Some of your older caucus members who were responsible for putting Shearer in as Leader need to move on, and I’m sure you know who these people are also.

Thanks Phil. Of the housing policy, I’m convinced; that certainly wasn’t a jibe at your portfolio. I’d only add that the Green’s financing package, which essentially leverages people into their own dwellings, is an excellent addition to these otherwise entirely compatible visions.

It’s the limited interference of the 5th Labour Government in other market failures which my comment refers to, and I express a hope that you as a caucus have moved on. There’s reason to believe so, and occasionally reason not to (ambivalence rather than opposition to the TPPA, for example).

Phil. A really helpful policy that should have been done from the creation of Kiwibank is that Kiwibank should exist not to make a profit but to benefit Kiwis. Kiwibank should only cover it’s costs by way of fees and nothing more. It should make use of the fractional reserve banking system to provide very low or even no interest loans to first home buyers. Because the bank is creating “money” out of thin air by way of bank credit, inflation is irrelevant from the banks perspective.

The “profit” generated would be in a form other than cash profit, such as first home buyers spending more into the economy instead of paying interest, or using the extra cash to expand their small business, etc,etc,etc.

I think this policy is good to be honest. It strikes me as odd the someone should hold on to property here without actually residing in the country and if Chine, UK et al. have similar policies then it makes sense to align our policies.

It’s lying and crying. Mockery is what you get when you post here. It saddens me that you are a professional economist. I think you owe the country an apology for that. It just means you have an opinion other economists will disagree with.

srylands, are you aware that annual GDP growth is on average nearly a full 1% higher under Labour governments than National governments. Imagine what NZ’s GDP would be if we only ever had Labour governments….we would probably be a very wealthy little nation.

The Commission has found that taxation was not a key driver of the recent housing boom.

“We carefully considered the claims that housing is tax advantaged, but concluded that any advantage is much smaller than often suggested” said Mr Sherwin.

Containment policies such as ‘Smart Growth’ and Auckland’s Metropolitan Urban Limit (MUL) were also found by the Commission to have an adverse effect on housing affordability by limiting the availability of land for housing.

“Pressure on land prices needs to be reduced and the Commission has recommended that there be an immediate release of new land for residential development in high demand areas such as Auckland and Christchurch”.

Here’s a “professional real estate” man although more like a caricature of someone in the “industry” and would in fact be hilarious if knowing there are people like him out there wasn’t so tragic. Almost unbelievable but he’s for real all right.

Um – if we have insufficient supply in a product, then surely reducing demand (by limiting overseas ownership) will at least partially go some way to counteracting the inflated prices? According to standard economics, of course. I mean it’s all bullshit, but you could at least apply that bullshit consistently.

Containment policies such as ‘Smart Growth’ and Auckland’s Metropolitan Urban Limit (MUL) were also found by the Commission to have an adverse effect on housing affordability by limiting the availability of land for housing.

it also states that migrations is the most significant driver of AK house prices both in the past and the now,but you seemed to have overlooked that part.

There is no supply problem in NZ ,it is a distribution problem,there is ample existing infrastructure such as hospitals schools services in the heartland (where things used to be made) as opposed to the consumption economy of AK.

This report, read carefully, shows that Auckland has land supply provision until 2028. My understanding is that current policies, changed since this report, will add significantly to the land supply described in this report.

Firstly, there wouldn’t be any point in targeting it at “anti asian” people in the Labour party. Labour party people are already going to vote Labour. Secondly, it has been made clear – very clear – it is aimed at foreign house buyers, the majority of whom are not asian.

There would have been a time when no New Zealand Labour leader would ever expound on the topic of housing without mentioning this jewel in the crown of state provision of housing, founded and championed by the Labour Party.

It is a simple fact that $300,000 “affordable houses” are way beyond the reach of the majority of working class New Zealanders. Meaning that they will either have to rent in the public or private sector or live on the streets. With the running down of state housing stock through privatisation and evictions, in the future most of those who need homes will have to rent in the unregulated private sector. Unlike most countries, (even the US has rent control), New Zealand does not have rent control law and bylaws. Mainly because the private rental sector had to stay competitive with state housing, and so there was no need for rent control.

With the continual shrinking of the state housing stock and the disappearance of this bottom line, this glaring omission will need to be redressed.

Again this issue wasn’t raised.

This housing policy does nothing for me. I would have to give it a fail.

BUT … didn’t he promise 10,000 houses a year for the following ten years? Judging from what I saw in my younger days if we had more state housing with rents at a reasonable proportion of people’s income then most would enjoy a much better standard of life and living.

My personal solution was to build my own house which meant that I never had a very large mortgage … in fact the largest mortgage was when I used my house as security for money to pay for an extended oversea’s trip. I was not in the building industry I will add.

Even today the cost would be a fraction of buying an existing house. I never owed more than 5T. Perhaps 80T in today’s market.

Yes that used to be Labour party policy, intent, and, action, there’s heaps of us ‘State House kids all’ even Slippery the Prime Minister enjoyed the protection of a State house,

Neo-solutions have Labour firmly fixated upon the children of the middle class being able to BUY a house and the blue collar workers, the Mene Mene’s of this world trapped, Him, Wife, and 3 kids all crammed into 1 room in a boarding house,

There are Mene Mene’s by the 10’s of thousands out there, trapped paying 50%+ of their income to rent anything, even 1 room, the ‘Flagship’ from Labour looks to them like a sinking one…

Jenny, the reason David didnt talk about state housing today is that he was announcing a different housing policy. It might have got a little confusing if he had. As housing spokesperson I am constantly talking about state housing and social housing. Google if you doubt it. We are developing policy on making renting a better option, the future of state housing, and expanding social housing provision in the community sector, and will announce those policies before the election.

“We are developing policy on making renting a better option, the future of state housing, and expanding social housing provision in the community sector” sounds like ACT Party policy: forcing people out of home ownership and into renting, selling off state houses and pushing responsibility for social housing on to the voluntary sector.

Hmmm. Yeah. I must admit my hackles were rising a bit when I read that and pondered on its fuzziness and the jargon. Would like a slightly more layperson’s description of what that actually means, really.

Firstly a big ups to Phil Twyford for engaging with us here at the Standard, and for quite a large chunk of his day at that,(careful Phill you might get hooked, debating here can become quite addictive),

i will try and make this comment as brief as possible, but doubt that mission will have any great success,

What you have so far said gives the impression, vis a vis State Housing, that you will continue what National are in essence doing with the State housing stock, in a word Tinker, is there or has there been a Need an overt calling from the ‘Social Housing sector’ to gain more of the State Housing stock which they would then control,

Tinkering with the States housing stock might give Labour and those Social agencies a flush of the warm touchy feelies but how does this increase the woeful numbers of state rentals,

For a population of 3.3 million souls we had a State housing stock of some 75,000 thousand, for the current population of 4.4 million it is what???, 67,000 and falling????,

IF Phill, you or anyone else is suggesting that the % of the 4.4 million population that NEEDS State housing is any less than the % of the 3.3 million population that did then probably the conversation should stop right here,

i would suggest to you that the % of the current 4.4 million population that NEEDS state housing is the same if not more, considering the stagnation of pay rates in the past 30 years for low income workers, as the % of the previous 3.3 million population that had State housing,

To simplify the numbers, for a population of 3.3 million there were 75,000 state houses, for a population of 4.4 million a mere 67,000 and falling state houses,

Those numbers alone Phill, would scream at anyone that the current NEED for state housing is in the vicinity of 100,000 State houses….

So would I. The concept of “social housing” as a sort of add-on to some unstated conception of “proper, real-people’s-housing” also rings alarm bells with me, especially in a place with very low wages in relation to costs.

Olwyn, yes, what you say ‘seems’ to be the underlying theme of today’s view of State Housing, ooooh the poor peoples houses in other words,

i was born into a State House, as were my 4 brothers and sisters, of the 5 of us, 2 a brother and a sister openly and vocally abhor ‘State Houses’ looking down upon them and preferring to either rent or own,

This ‘seems’ to also be the prevailing political view of the moment and has been for quite some time,

Quite bluntly, and rudely i might add, is f**k such a view, those with middle class incomes and aspirations who with previous help in many cases from the State have found the comfort of the middle class, and that movement into the middle class has been one of previous blue collar employees, wharfies, nurses, teachers etc,

Having said that, the ‘blue collar’ has not shrunk in numbers and it is this blue collar in the main that is ‘trapped’, simply having a job these days mostly disqualifies them from access to State Housing,(HousingNZ will simply show them the private sector rental ads if they apply),

In Auckland in particular, but not specifically, it is the middle class that have piled into ‘rentals’ as an investment’ and the ‘shrinking’ of the HousingNZ stock means that demand for such ‘rentals’ will remain, (shoehorning the children of that middle class onto the ‘ownership ladder’ will simply result in 5 years time those that have been being able to turn their growing equity into a 2nd house as a ‘rental’),

The political party’s in the main concentrate their efforts on producing policy that pleases that middle class, Labour appear to have formed the opinion that to build 10,000 extra State rentals in Auckland, to be particular, would not please the middle class who with their addiction to the property ladder would struggle to keep their rentals tenanted if the ‘blue collar’ had access to State rentals at 25% of income as the rent,

That is my perception, garnered from what i have heard and seen so far, i would love to be proved wrong, but that could only happen when the political party’s provide the housing solutions to those MOST IN NEED, and i don’t see that solution to be shoehorning the children of the middle class into home ownership…

A lot of people would appreciate Labour answering a lot of questions about a number of social policies it purports to have, some we’ve heard absolutely nothing on for a number of years now. I guess their silence has worked because people have given up asking.

That’s the trouble with Labour. Take its welfare policy, for example. Try getting Labour to talk about that. It won’t, and has not since it was questioned over its neo-liberal reforms of 2007. That’s almost two terms ago. Twyford’s ambiguity is alarmingly familiar.

1. Labour believes it is the fundamental responsibility of the state to provide a decent roof over the heads of our most disadvantaged citizens, and to ensure everyone else can get there on their own. We believe Housing NZ, as a government owned and run social housing agency providing income-related rental housing is a vital part of that.

2.Labour will announce policy on state housing before the election. I am on record that we will increase the housing stock. Currently Housing NZ houses 4-5% of the population. If we want it to be a safety net for people who struggle to get decent housing in the private rental market then in my view 5% is too low.

3. Labour will rebuild and revitalise Housing NZ. Under National the organisation has been run down. Its restructuring has been a fiasco: 24 offices closed, 121 full time staff laid off, and tenancy officers replaced with an 0800 number. Tenants wait for weeks and months to get basic maintenance done. Rent arrears are up. National redefined the eligibility criteria slashing waiting lists at the stroke of a pen. The number of vacant houses has soared while thousands of people who would previously have been eligible for a state house have been forced into overcrowded and substandard accommodation in the private rental market. Housing NZ has botched three redevelopment projects (Glen Innes North, Maraenui and Pomare) dividing communities and treating their tenants with contempt.

4. Labour wants to see a bigger role for the community housing NGOs. They do a great job, they are innovative, they are motivated by a social conscience – we want to see them working in a partnership with Housing NZ and will go into the election with a plan to achieve just that. Unfortunately National’s neoliberal approach is to strip Housing NZ of its functions, hand over its stock to the NGOs and leave the remains of Housing NZ to compete with the NGOs as just another tenancy manager.

5. There are a number of other things we must do to ease the hardship caused by a perfect storm of market failure and poor regulation:

* Labour will legislate our Healthy Homes Guarantee, amending the Residential Tenancies Act to make it compulsory for landlords to ensure their properties are warm and dry, meeting minimum standards for insulation and efficient heating.

* We need to fix the the housing market :
– solving the supply problem by building 100,000 affordable starter homes (Kiwibuild)
– taking the heat out of the market by taxing the speculators through a Capital Gains Tax, and restricting overseas speculators
– tackling the various cost drivers that make new homes so expensive (poor productivity and lack of scale in the building industry, land supply problems in Auckland, lack of competition in the supply of building materials, prohibitive cost of preparing raw land for development, planning rules that impede good development).
These things will go a long way to fixing the market failure that has the worst impacts on the poor.

* Currently about a third of the population are in the private rental market. We need to make renting a better option and can learn from plenty of overseas countries. More security of tenure would be a good start.

* Central government needs to be much more hands-on in enabling urban renewal. I intend that we will use urban development agencies to undertake large-scale projects building and revitalising mixed-income, mixed-tenure and mixed-use communities around public transport infrastructure. These will provide the settings for much of the state, social and affordable housing we want to build.

“Labour wants to see a bigger role for the community housing NGOs. They do a great job, they are innovative, they are motivated by a social conscience – we want to see them working in a partnership with Housing NZ and will go into the election with a plan to achieve just that.”

I’m assuming here that you mean you’ll be investing more into NGOs being able to provide housing to specific groups such as disabled people, women’s refuge etc i.e. the relatively rare but important situations where the community sector is in fact better equipped to deliver the service?

“We need to make renting a better option and can learn from plenty of overseas countries.”

I’d like to think that you really meant to say: “For those renting, at any given point in time, and when it’s the most appropriate option, issues such as housing standards, affordability, security of tenure and tenants’ rights need to be lifted to adequate standards.”

Thanks for the reply Phil. I see what look like some good ideas in there, most particularly those which involve increasing the stock of state houses and security of tenure for renters. I am still not sure as to how broadly affordable the affordable housing will prove to be, or what the role of NGO’s will be in this mix, though I assume by your criticisms that it will differ from what it has become under National.

Thanks for the reply Phill, (Owlyn i tacked this on as a reply so it sits in the queue in line with the time it was written),

Phill, this conversation has been going around for quite a few ‘posts’ and quite some time now, and, in this post i have been saying to you much the same as i said to Labour’s previous spokesperson who gave much the same if a more guarded response as you have,

Don’t take that as a criticism as i thank both you and Annette for taking the time to actually engage here at the Standard,

What i would like to add is this, there has been a major change in the demographic of tenants who can gain a HousingNZ tenancy, i think you will agree with me that the beneficiary class,(and yes class is an ugly word to use, but class is what Neo-Liberalism has divided us, again, into), is now the predominant tenant of HousingNZ,

Having said that, HousingNZ is housing those who it was originally supposed to, ie: those most in need,

However, in my parents time, yes State house tenants, when the unwritten social contract had us all striving as a nation for full employment the majority of State House tenants were the low waged blue collar workforce,

That low waged blue collar workforce, who can never really hope to own a home are still out there but now forced to rent in the private sector, their NEED i would suggest is as great now as was the need back in the days when my parents first gained the luxury of paying 25% of their low income to the State for rental of a State house,

i would suggest to you that the numbers of State Houses needed by the beneficiary class of tenant is about right and it is in fact the low waged blue collar working families which are in just as much need as those same low waged blue collar workers were in my parents time,

This NEED felt more in the same cities as the affordability issues around buying a home simply leaves that demographic locked out of affordable rental housing and locked into paying 50+% of their income to the private sector as rent,

IF Labour has any intention to rebuild the HousingNZ portfolio to any extent where the numbers reflect the reality of the real NEED in our society,and i have commented upon that in my other comment so wont get into repetition, then i would ask Labour to consider a gradual shift in emphasis which bases allocation of State Housing as (A), those most in need and a beneficiary, and (B), those most in need and a low waged working family,

That is probably a curved ball in terms of thinking thrown your way from way out in left field, but IF Labour intends to rebuild it’s HousingNZ stock by any substantial amount then a gradual mixing of both the (A) and the (B) categories from above would in the time of such a rebuild which reflected the ‘real need’ of affordable rental housing, see HousingNZ be put in a position of being able to offer a home to a beneficiary as they do now based upon need, AND, offer the next available home to a low income working family based upon the fact that they are the lowest income working family in the application file,

Lolz, in answer to your comment above i could go on all night, but better bring this ‘comment’ to a close befor it becomes a book, stick around tho Phill, perhaps offer up to the Standard the different bits of your comment above as ‘Guest Posts’ there’s way to much detail there to be considered in the one post,

i would befor i close tho, after having watched the end of a Campbell Live show tonight suggest you add SAFE to your healthy homes legislation,(could swear that bloke Campbell is some sort of Socialist, set the damn GCSB onto him that’s what i say),

Disclaimer, lolz, i am not a low waged blue collar worker with a family…

As a brief add on to my previous comment, i listened to the economist Rob Oram today on RadioNZ National, (He has a regular 11 o’clock slot on a Tuesday),

His critique of Labour’s move to ban foreign speculators from purchasing existing property was favorable in terms of the economics discussed,

Rob refuses to discuss economics in terms of politics even going so far as to castigate the nine to Noon host when she has attempted to lead Him on,

Rob also spoke well about the issue of ‘affordable housing’ pointing to a study,(sorry i forgot the authors), which in a nutshell says this:

”Going back 30 years we find that at that time 30% of housing built was dedicated to housing the demographic earning the lowest 30% of income”,

Today we find that house building dedicated to the demographic earning the lowest 30% of income is PRACTICALLY ZERO”,

Now while that isnt a direct quote from the housing study Rob Oram was quoting from it is the gist of what He said while Rob says it in terms of ‘studied economics’ i say it in terms of people, we are in fact saying exactly the same things from the perspective of our different world views,

Big UP’s to Rob for his clear and concise economics and always providing the justification for the views He puts forward…

srylands is an economist? Well, perhaps they are downsizing in his silo? So he’s got all this spare time to dally with the proles. Try spending more time in your veg garden, according to what we hear that will be a useful practical hands on type of activity that will be more healthy for you than that spent in your own virtual world.

srylands
You realise that Pol Pot’s government took charge of people’s lives, decided they were of no value intrinsically, ordered them out of their homes, forced them to move where they wanted them to work, broke up families, used violence and death and armed government organisatios against them, denied democratic government and rights – all things that have happened in recent times in NZ and continue to expand and grow.

The torture chambers were an example of ‘Absolute power corrupts absolutely’ mixed with fundamentalist ideology. You might check where your beliefs are taking you and whether you assess yourself as having respect for all people, and goodwill and desire to be kind where you can and not harsh and callous where you don’t feel kindness is deserved. Because that approach is what a relatively harmonious and happy world grows from.

hmmmph, missed all the commentary above. Imhumbleo this is great news. Foreign buyers make up something between 5 and 10% of the market and that is significant. This will have a positive effect. It is one of the problems with our high housing costs. There are others too so if each of the problems is dealt with then eventually the problem should, hopefully, get resolved.

Wouldn’t it be grand if houses were around $150-200,000. You know, about 3 times the average wage.

Imagine what we could do with the extra money….
Instead of paying it to banks……
We could use it for our lives instead…….

And then later watch when this phenomenon catches up in the corporate world and those conservative types in there (who are always followers) realise that if similar policies were enacted there then prices for their farms, their factories, their yards would all come down too and they too would have lots more extra moola in their pockets.

Of course it is zenophobic … just like the controls the other nations are establishing … but two or more wrongs do not make a right.
The trouble is the pre-occupation of Kiwis in owning their quarter acre section and house … incipient capitalists at heart. The bankers are laughing all the way to the bank at the profits they make from mortgages.

VTO with this and subsequent postings illustrates that he is of the foolish Labour supporter type that holds back Labour from the treasury benches. Vacant from the neck upwards?, unlikely, but full of ideological nonsense and bitterness.

As for trickledrown you may be correct but you ignore the stable families of the original state houses who worked hard and had a good life, much better than I at that time, with cars etc while I just managed to get an old motorbike. That was before so many solo parents came on the scene to give welfare a bad name …. but from my experience of boarding an unemployed person for a short period I know it is an unfortunate ‘game’ of each party trying to beat the other or ‘do them down’. I struck the different beaurocratic mentality’s when I shifted from Auckland to Dunedin. … Auckland worked hard to provide me with what the rule book suggested was my due, which Wellington cut back on, while subsequently I found Dunedin acted as if it was their money they were handing out.

j whatever owning our own property is a family strengthening base !
that gives families a stable community in which to bring up mentally stable and physically healthy children, children who go to the same school and not change schools don’t change doctors,
do better educationally and health wise home ownership brings that stability!
The only reason the banks are laughing is because speculators are making it easy for them to make more money in a relatively unproductive sector.
Cynicism is your tool to undermine a good policy!
The English Chinese and other foreign speculators don’t let us buy any property so why should we let huge powerful economies with vast amounts of money ruin the Kiwi Dream !
The speculative bludgers who add nothing to our economy except debt(debt to individuals who have to raise a higher mortgage because of speculation govt debt because many of these speculator don’t pay tax therefore bill English has to borrow more damage to economic growth by reducing the amount of money that would flow into the productive sector) are up in arms and will stop at nothing to undermine this policy!
It makes me spew the amount of tax my wife and I pay in tax every year while these speculators drive round in flash cars use all the infrastructure ie roads hospitals police schools university etc and many are multi millionaires just big bullying bludgers you lot are!
Its good to see the Pope and head of the church of England speak out about this selfish individualistic greed culture that is destroying community!
The Archbishop of Canterbury said their are few people rip off the welfare system but their as just as many wealthy people ripping the system off the poor get the book thrown at them the wealthy get off when the finger is pointed at you!

Very good Lanthanide. Personally I find the Chinese very nice people and happy to have them running my local dairy and chip shop ….they also serve chinese which is a refreshing change from the plain old F&C.

Oh you mean like how this far right government goes the whole hog with its welfare mentality, handing out gigantic great dollops of welfare to greedy business people who can’t make a fist of it on their own?

John Key – biggest welfare provider ever in the history of NZ. Looking forward to drug testing for business people in receipt of handouts.

I assume you are taking the piss? This is not even a right wing government. New Zealanders would never support a “far right” government. Do you even know what they look like? Do you get out much? A “far right” government would not be polling close to 50% in New Zealand.

On business transfers, New Zealand has the lowest levels of net transfers to business of any country in the OECD. You must be in a time warp.

You’re a fool rylands. How much voter support did h1tler gain during his rise? What d you think those germans thought at the time? They would have posted just like you. Fool.

What I laugh at is how this far right government extols the virtues of free market forces and then instantly abandons them (Ecan, Chch rebuild, diary irrigation for just 3 examples) to hand out handouts.

So you are saying (seriously) that the policies of the New Zealand Government are analogous to the Nazi Party in the 1930s, and, just like then, nearly 50% of the New Zealand electorate has been seduced by a mad person?

ffs. It means that the good german people who overwhelmingly supported that mad man would similarly have laughed at any suggestion their government was a far right one, or at least heading very strongly in that direction.

srylands facts and figures please!
We are one of the only countries in the OECD that doesn;t have land taxes or CGT!
Maybe the govt would be able to afford to spend some money on developing our economy instead of letting lazy unproductive speculators stifle our economy to Quote Don Brash your free market super hero!

How do you distinguish between the “unproductive speculators” and the people who work hard and deprive themselves of instant gratification as they buy a second or third house to provide a bit of extra for their retirement?

A Capital Gains Tax might shift the emphasise from house owning to the share market but house owning appears the safer place to put one’s nestegg. So though it wouldn’t bother me ;personally I don’t think the CGT as as good an idea as at first it seems.

House owning is the golden dream of the kiwi but by the time you add up all the interest you pay on the money the bank lends you it doesn’t compare that favourably with renting. The way I did it became a multiple plus that I paid quite little to the bank, I had income to spend on a quite good life for my family [ whikle others were crippled by the high interest rates during the ’70 Labour Government], and at the end it sold for a good price after providing me with low cost housing for thirty years. The crux of renting is having a good landlord and sadly there are not that many around.

wayne telling porkies the overseas investors can’t use that electricity unless they have a very long electrical cord!
Another lie is this is not targeting immigrants you naive idiot its targeting absentee investors this policy would benefit immigrant making property cheaper for people living and working in NZ .
You are supporting those who are pushing up house prices and taking money out of the country without any added benefit other than to other NZders who speculate and pa y no tax!

KK peanuts for diet peanuts for brains
overseas investors by your implications don’t match the facts
read carefully peanut brain!
largest overseas speculators in no 1 position are the English who make up the largest number!
Australia no 2 property speculators!
Followed bt the Chinese at no 3!
you are incapable of being honest just like john Key!
As for your idea that it will not effect your tax free capital gains if it is not going to affect you why all the worry !
it will effect you thats why you are telling so many lies ,trying to spread cynicism to undermine a good and popular policy!
Remember that bastion of the free market Don Brash.
Rodney hide set up the productivity commission chaired by Brash the only ruling they made in their very thorough investigation was that housing affordability was the biggest hurdle for economic growth in NZ but referring mainly to Auckland!
Key canned the funding of the commission because so many National supporters are non tax paying property speculators free loading bludgers like your self primitive primate you and your racist implications are as pathetic as your pathetic name!

The policy will have a very tiny impact on house prices because at the margin it will deter some buyers. But it does not past any cost benefit test. The cost of running it will be high and it will be open to widespread avoidance.

There will also be unintended consequences. Short term residents on work visas will now need to rent rather than buy. But they still need to live in a house, and they still need to pay for it. Someone needs to own it and they are still displacing a New Zealander.

The problem is not enough houses being built, and not enough land is being released. There is no shortage of land. I can see lots of it outside my window right now. There are cows on it. Ditch the cows and build houses.

“Where do your mythical 5 to 10 percent of buyers live if they dont buy?” They are foreigners i.e. they don’t live here at all. Keep up.

“Or they just rort the new “law” via any one of a hundred possible ways.” Sure, there are always scammers and bludgers and criminals when it comes to any law. The vast bulk of people tend to comply with the law. But I can see how you come to that view given that this far right government breaks our laws at will and with no consequence. Your argument isn’t one.

Ok just for you since you seem to be more than a little slow on the issue…

These mythical “speculators” that are buying up all the houses …… who is living in the house that they buy? There isnt as far as I know 10% of NZ housing stock sitting empty somewhere is there? maybe there is and I just missed 100,000 or so vacant houses scattered around the place?

You really are astroturfing up a storm over this silly policy arent you?

VTO seems to think if you take one class of investor out of the market then there will be less demand.
People still need to live somewhere.
Unless these mythical evil speculators are buying and holding empty houses there will be no change in housing demand as other investors will buy up the housing stock to satisfy the demand for tennants.
Rents will probably climb as less investors control more housing so less competition but that isnt my problem.

So there is no change in housing availability and you have entrenched the power of a few Landlords to raise rents as they have less competition, actually you have ensured that rents will rise as the remaining pool of Landlords have only more expensive funding sources so they must depend higher cash returns.

But now that house won’t have been be bought and sold so many times and for so much profit by so many speculators, thus over time lowering the overhead (relative to the counterfactual) and therefore the market rent.

But the increase in the cost of capital would still result in a house price lower than the prices we see with overseas absentee owners in the market.

Otherwise the absentee overseas owners wouldn’t be outbidding people now.

And that’s without the reserve banks flexing its automatic muscles regarding the price of capital.

Think about it this way: currently the highest bidder for property X is an overseas investor offering $400k through an agent. If the investor is out of the picture, residential purchasers might have to drop their offer from $395k to $390k because higher interest lowers the sticker price they can pay by $5k. But they’re still the highest bidder. The sticker price drops because the previously highest bidders are no longer in the market, and people are still working on the same budget (“what I have” + “what I can borrow and repay”).

Without you providing supporting data to support your assertions, I can only conclude that you are talking utter nonsense.

The policy will have a very tiny impact on house prices because at the margin it will deter some buyers. But it does not past any cost benefit test. The cost of running it will be high and it will be open to widespread avoidance.

Where’s your supporting data?

There will also be unintended consequences. Short term residents on work visas will now need to rent rather than buy. But they still need to live in a house, and they still need to pay for it. Someone needs to own it and they are still displacing a New Zealander.

This doesn’t make any kind of sense.

The problem is not enough houses being built, and not enough land is being released. There is no shortage of land. I can see lots of it outside my window right now. There are cows on it. Ditch the cows and build houses.

Try reading a geography 101 book, or even a high school geography book. In any of these you will find that human settlements occur on the most productive land.

“An immediate release of land for residential development would ease supply constraints and reduce the pressure on prices. This could be achieved by bringing significant tracts of new residential land on the urban fringe (greenfield) and urban land that could be redeveloped for housing (brownfield) land to the market.”

Funny there is nothing in there about foreign speculators being the problem. Huh.

But I guess David Shearer knows more about the housing market than these guys.

the cost of green field development is exponentially higher than developing existing areas with existing infrastructure facts right!
Why should we allow massive economies swamp our housing market when they don’t allow us the reciprocal rights

“The cost of green field development is exponentially higher than developing existing areas with existing infrastructure facts right! (sic)”

So why are houses expensive? If green fields developments carry external costs you charge for them. The market can determine where people want to live.

“Why should we allow massive economies swamp our housing market when they don’t allow us the reciprocal rights”

They are not.

Anyway reciprical rights is debunked – we don’t follow that line in our trade policy. Do you think we should “recipricate” by having huge subsidies for dairy because the USA and EU do? Do you really want to “recipricate” all the policies of other countries, no matter how dumb?

How about we “recipricate” USA corn subsidies? It would be just as stupid as recipricating stupid house ownership policies.

srylands Explain that to Don Brash at the productivity Commission!
A tradeble commodity is different from a place where kiwi families and workers have live idiot Don Brash’s research at the productivity commission was dismissed by your great liar sorry leader because the National party rely heavily on funding and propaganda from the speculators and the super profitable banks that lend money to these speculators!
Don Brash got the sack as the productivity Commission was disbanded because of this!

That’s one of the main problems with economics and economists (If Sryland is one). There is no room in the market economic model for social relations or responsibility. People and their welfare are not deemed important other than they are producers and consumers. Take any of the free market model calculations or measures and you’ll see none of them have the welfare or stableness of society as part of the equation. The family and their ability to survive are not considered as relevant in terms of inputs into calculations.

Cartels in the building sector e.g. cement
GST
Council development contributions.
Foreign buyers.
Land supply at times.
Lumping all community costs with new subdivisions onto the first owners rather than spreading it across generations.
Greed and speculation.
Banks making shitloads from their printed money pushing more and more into the market.
Increasing regulation e.g. replacing ladders with scaffold has just now added another $4k to a new house.
Lack of taxation on all forms of money-making i.e. CGT.

If green fields developments carry external costs you charge for them. The market can determine where people want to live.

The developers are already complaining about how much the councils charge for consents. What do you think will happen when they not only go up in price but that the price is also variable in relation to how far away from the CBD?

Srylands more rather than less several very expensive incursions have happened after national cut funding and staff numbers!
ie painted apple moth came into the country after national cuts of the 1990’s cost to us tax payers $450 million directly plus ongoing health care for those who suffered health consequences!
More recently kiwifruit under National cuts were made of a few million dollars and 29 staff, loss to the economy of over $1 billion and ongoing!
minister of agriculture on finding out immediately reinstated funding and staff Funny that!

david the cyniscist you are lying NZ residents and citizens what ever their nationality are not affected in any way other than their house values will go up as fast!
absentee investors will be !
Poms make up the largest numbers of absentee speculators!
so why haven’t you acused us of pome bashing you are the RACIST by implication!

Well LP/Greens didnt have much to say when they allowed 100,000’s of Ha of land to be sold to overseas intrests in the early 2000’s but when Crafar farms came up on the block to be sold to the evil Chinese then yes the racist screams came from both those parties. I dont see this as any different.
Shearer must have found it difficult to talk on RedRadio with that dogwhistle jammed so firmly in his mouth.

Nice the way you dont mention the Ozzies who are excluded from this daft policy btw.

but when Crafar farms came up on the block to be sold to the evil Chinese then yes the racist screams came from both those parties.

WRONG!

The reason the Crafar sale caused such a stir was that it was one of the only land sales to foreigners which got any publicity before the OIO rubberstamped it’s sale. So for the first time New Zealanders’ had a chance to say that “we don’t want our land to be owned by foreigners”. In nearly every other instance of land sales to foreigners we find out the OIO has rubberstamped the deal, the sale has been done and we can go suck a kumara if we are upset about it.

The issue of the prospective buyers being Chinese was a convenient red herring to divert people from the real issue at stake. (Given New Zealand’s appalling treatment of Chinese people and the guilt we should all feel about it, the red herring proved very effective)

So you are saying that the LP and the Gweens did not red flag the other sales, literally 100,000’s of Ha of land, that was sold to overseas while the LP was in office because they did not know it was happening?

So when Harvard that purchased 170,000 Ha’s that was widley reported in the media here and in USA the ruling LP and the Gweens (backbenches still) didnt notice it?

The Overseas Investment Office (OIO) recently gave approval to Harvard University in the United States for the purchase of Big Sky Dairy Farms in the Maniatoto district.
…
Green Party co-leader Russel Norman said it was disappointing the Big Sky bid got the green light, and had the party been aware of the application and run a campaign around it, the result might have been different.

Labour’s agriculture spokesman Damien O’Connor said today it appeared National was frightened by reaction to the Natural Dairy bid but considered the Big Sky sale wasn’t as contentious.

“But the issue has never been about China or any other country of origin,” he said. “It’s about having rules that work effectively and that can be clearly understood by everyone.

Source: http://www.nzherald.co.nz/business/news/article.cfm?c_id=3&objectid=10679083
Regardless of what either party may have done further in the past*, recent evidence indicates both are opposed to land sales to ALL foreigners. In any case, these articles further highlight the fact that the reason the Crafar farms received widespread attention was the publicity regarding their sale. This was not the case for other land sales and therefore these flew under the radar and only received condemnation from both parties after the sales are approved.

*You can harp on about with the ‘they did it too’ excuses as much as you want, but no one really cares. The fact that Labour may have done it in the past is irrelevant to what needs to happen now – the land sales need to stop and Labour is now on the right track.

SWDC shifting the blame again!
Trusts no longer provide any advantage but lawyers still sell them at grossly inflated prices who do these greedy lawyers and Accountants vote for Nactional! so SW&DC you should be applauding your own observation ironic that!
But Silly and the Cynic your rant has nothing to do with this thread!

erikter and Steve Wrathall and DavidC
What a pretty bunch of cheerleaders. Jump together, arms up, wiggle your bottoms, flip your skirts up and down. You don’t need to bother to say anything intelligent, that’s not your thing is it. And you are as co-ordinated as synchronised swimmers.

Cheerleaders or swimmers? What do you think? Should we take a poll on this important distinction? This is the sort of conundrum that you are so suited to discussing.

The Housing Rort should have been stopped like climate change 30 years ago with punitive capital gains taxes for capital gain speculators and prevention of foreigners buying our housing stock.
It’s now too too too late and we have totally ruined the housing market for the most important people, our young people because of GREED. Labours policy is 30 years too late. The horse bolted the open stable doors 30 years ago now they propose to partially close them.We’ve become a greedy little pig island no wonder 150,000 of our most employable have f@ck*d off to Australia where at least they pay you there decently!

I personally think people should only buy a house to live in. I think speculation or profit should not have a place in housing (other than when you sell a house to move and buy another one). This of course would not suit a lot of house owners here who love to rip off vulnerable tenants such as those charging huge prices in Christchurch in the aftermath of the quakes I’m just stating this just so you know where I’m coming from.

What get’s me that David Schearer does not address this as a socialist indicating that it is OK for Kiwi’s to rip off other Kiwi’s. He just objects to foreigners doing this so here is my 2 cents on it!

Betcha it hasn’t Wayne. Immigrants are not stupid. They can see that our house prices are absurdly high. They can see that anything that helps bring down the amount of money they have to pay for a roof over their heads is good for them.

I don’t imagine they care too much about foreigners wanting to be absentee landlords.

Correct but unfortunately the woeful launch of this policy, which is a eminently sensible one, has allowed it to be framed as anti asian anti immigrant etc……. the sad thing is it should have been easy to sell this policy and remove any accusation of xenophobia if it had been done correctly.

Yes well that Winston is one other reality in the voting scheme, rather than the lard that Wayne has posted.

Hopefully those such voters will see that in the long term they will end up with a more healthy society with greater home ownership and less money going into housing, allowing more for food, education, fast cars, children, corporate bludgers, pretty much everything.

Only if the Right continues with its Labour is xenophobic, racist, anti-immigrant falsely attributed campaign. But the wise and aware among us can already see that giving Labour’s policy these false attributes will only rebound on the accusers. It’s the age old battle between lies and the truth, between self-serving psychopathy and fairness to all.

Also trending on Twitter is an accusation that Labour’s “numbers” (i.e., scribbles on the back of a napkin) to justify the policy mistakenly include properties owned by NZ citizens who are presently overseas. Which would be, you know, a bit of a muppet-level fuckup. If it were true.

That meme about this policy losing the asian vote is going to be pushed more and more, I think. TVNZ is already on-board. As well as headlining this perfectly sensible and internationally accepted policy as “radical” and “very controversial” before its even got off the ground. The report last night featured the “xenophobic, race-card” fallacies and included this comment . . .

“The reaction from the Chinese community will think that this is race related and is targeting just the Chinese because if it is about curbing the foreign buyers’ investment it should ban everyone, not just the Chinese, and should include Australians as well,”

. . . from Bevan Chuang of the Chinese Community Centre but without letting the audience know Bevan is a National Ltd™-linked candidate in the up-coming local board elections.

The TVNZ news report eventually cuts across to Political Editor Corin Dann “live”, but breathless in his “analysis” which, basically, avoids actually discussing the policy and instead goes for the ad hom in repeating the “David Shearer leadership” media fantasy. Dann then concludes his “live” segment with a virtual apology for John Key’s stunned-mullet reaction to the announcement.

Meanwhile, Bevan Chuang’s Facebook Page is running riot with over the top claims of racism and xenphobia, and this is filtering out into the Chinese community.

Frustrating as all get out to see both the MSM and Tory politicians working hand in hand but, judging by the reactions from both, this housing policy has really got them frazzled and, IMHO, exposes both as lacking worthy pinciples.

Labour’s housing policy to restrict house sales to foreigners could be at odds with New Zealand’s Free Trade Agreement with China.

The policy, announced by leader David Shearer yesterday, would bar foreign non-residents, except Australians, from buying existing houses in a move to reduce house prices.

Constitutional lawyer Stephen Franks said that under Article 138 of the NZ China Free Trade Agreement, Chinese house buyers must be treated the same as New Zealanders after acquiring residential property but the protection did not extend to prospective buyers.

Article 139 requires that Chinese investors be treated no less favourably then investors of any other country.

Mr Franks said Labour’s policy was a direct breach of Article 139 in treating Australian investors more favourably than Chinese investors.

“Chinese would-be investors do not get direct rights to insist on investor equality, but they can’t be treated worse than Australians,” he said.

If I were involved with the National Party I’d be popping corks off champagne bottles right now, because in accordance with standard Labour operating procedure a completely mismanaged communications clusterf*ck has conveniently distracted everyone just when National was on the ropes about something (the GCSB bill).

I have a question. There are more than 1 million New Zealanders resident offshore. Some of them have been gone for years, or decades buy they own lots of houses here. Should they be required to sell their houses? They are off living in Sydney and London collecting rents from the poor under class in NZ. Evil.

Stop being a dickhead. I don’t have serious objections to the policy because it will affect my personal interests. I am objecting because it is being swallowed by gullible people like you as a solution to a problem that I agree is very real. It just won’t work. So it will be a deadweight cost on taxpayers – more public servants for example.

I want my kids to be able to afford houses too – I want policy action. But this is bad policy.

It will do NZ’s reputation no good and will marginally damage it. It is in the country’s interests to promote free flows of money and people. Whatever the number, New Zealand has a very high proportion of its citizens offshore and predictably they are the best educated and successful.

Policies that impede international connections have no future, and will fail.

So I am not worried because my house price is going to crash. I am worried because this is another example of snake oil. Just what we now expect from New Zealand First.

How is it in the countries best interests and the best interests of kiwis who want to buy a home of their own to allow foreigners who don’t live in NZ to buy houses here ahead of our hard working kiwis and then force us to pay rent which sends money offshore?

You’re bullshitting Sryland. Your fearful imagination sees disaster for the haves. You are a have. So you’re screaming. I do not hear your entitled elitist screams. Fuck off and be a professional economist hahaha oh how we (should) worship your shit.

J.K. Galbraith – “The modern conservative is engaged in one of man’s oldest exercises in moral philosophy; that is the search for a superior moral justification for selfishness.”

And those are just NZ born Kiwis. Once you take into account the children that they would have had here instead of overseas, we’re probably looking at the equivalent of a 1.25M reduction in NZ population.

If you folk can spare a minute or two from your slagging I suggest you go to Kiwiblog and read the statistics that Tony Alexander came up with back in May this year …. it tends to make the policy completely pointless.
One inferance was that o’sea owners were selling to other potential o’sea owners but the total o’seas buyers were without Aussie just 3.2% of trades. 4.6% o’seas owners selling. …. interesting I thought.

There are no particularly good stats for these types of overseas buyer residential type sales. Everything is inferred and/or “voluntary” like the MRIENZ surveys (like they don’t have a vested interest). For instance most of the overseas buyers actually have shelf companies here that do the actual purchases for various tax, ownership, and hide from their own tax authority reasons, so tend not to show up as overseas owners. I have seen two sales out of two that did exactly that.

So any analysis based on current data is very likely to be completely wrong. The enforcement regime for such a policy will generate the required data.

However even if this was the case, then lets just run with the policy and see what happens eh. If Labour is right then there will be an effect and an effective reduction in the rate of rise of house prices. If Kiwiblog and other National suppositories are, then nothing will happen.

Yes insert 5000 New state rentals a year into the Auckland market directly targeted at low income WORKING people in that city based upon the greatest need being the first in and there will be way less demand for rental accommodation thus there will be less desire for the middle class to be landlords and more supply for those wishing and able to buy,

Labour’s solution to shoehorn the children of those middle class landlords into home ownership is anathema to blue collar socialists on to many levels to address in the one comment…

I’ve been watching the MSM coverage, and by-and-large it’s all about how anti-Asian this policy is. Unless Labour gets on the front-foot ASAP, this policy (rightly or wrongly) will be condemned as both desperate and racist towards Asians (esp. Chinese)

And was the reaction unexpected ? Perhaps only by the strategists of labour, as they should have had a play book prepared and commenced to roll out the responses to give confidence that this is a well thoughtful policy and not a shotgun approach of throwing out all and any ideas and by chance a few take.
Is this fail to plan then plan to fail by labour think tank?

This policy is sending the right into a batshit crazy frenzy!! I know you fellas prefer not to get dirty on Whaleoil but Cam is so worried about it 10, that’s right 10 of his topics today are covering this policy.

This policy is sending the right into a batshit crazy frenzy!! I know you fellas prefer not to get dirty on Whaleoil but Cam is so worried about it 10, that’s right 10 of his topics today are covering this policy……

The current Government is not a right wing government. It is a slightly saner version of a left wing government. I’d call it “Labour-lite”. Basically a left of centre government without the crazy edges around free trade xenophobia and the greens.

But it is still left of centre upholding all the fabric of the welfare state and a large public sector. How on earth could you call it a “right wing” government?

BTW New Zealanders simply would not support a right wing government. National is riding high in the polls (close to 20% points ahead of Labour). Why? Because National leads a left of centre government.

Of course the cluster fuck that is MMP means that they could still lose the 2014 election.

I repeat we will NEVER have a right wing government in New Zealand (well not in the next 30 years). The right need to get used to that. This is why so many of the right wing policies that have merit in NZ – reducing minimum wages, a flat tax rate, genuinely smaller government – will never gain traction. All the current government is doing is making baby steps in the right direction. They can’t do any more because they would lose office.

Read the post – I’m not making Cam post it as a topic let alone 10. I have simply spent all day defending the fact that it isn’t racist and whatever other BS is being spouted about it. Personally this is a policy I have wanted to see for years.
But yep try to attack the messenger nit the message. That’s what generally happens when people have nothing eh wtl…..

srylands your out of date already, Mae Chen constitutional lawyer free trade lawyer said our agreement only has to treat China fairly equally to what we do with other countries!
so if we make a law it just has to be fair!
ie like China doesn’t allow us to buy land or houses in China so that would completely stuff your pathetic spin!

1. Each Party shall accord to investors, investments and activities associated with such investments by investors of the other Party treatment no less favourable than that accorded, in like circumstances, to the investments and associated activities by the investors of any third country with respect to admission, expansion, management, conduct, operation, maintenance, use, enjoyment and disposal.

That suggests that favourable treatment of Australia vs. China would be in breach.

There has been lots of talk recently about how Asians are pushing up property prices. Suddenly a policy gets released implicitly targeting that ethnic group. By that definition, you could argue its racist.

How would you feel if you are Chinese (or any other Asian nationality) and are now being told by a mainstream political party that you are bad for New Zealand? Its not exactly a vote winner…

Perhaps it might be good idea to not speculate on what any ethnic group thinks on the grounds that they’re probably quite capable of thinking & speaking for themselves, and they may even have different views amongst themselves. Being intelligent human beings and that sort of thing.

I don’t get your point. It is against all foreigners, not those from a particular country. Those who live here (permanent residents and citizens) are not foreigners. People who were born elsewhere but now call NZ their home don’t see themselves as foreigners when it comes to policies like this. Instead, what they really resent is people considering them foreigners just because they talk with a different accent or aren’t white.

Presumably he meant to say “it applies to”, not “against”. And “non-resident” would be better.

You might think it doesn’t matter, but 99% of voters are not reading long threads on The Standard. They’re watching the six o’clock news, or catching the headlines.

Watch the story (it’s on TV3 website). Contrast Russel Norman (positive message) with Shearer (defensive). He lacks basic political nous (e.g. never accept your opponent’s framing). That will kill Labour in the election campaign.

You’re correct in that those who hold Resident or Returning Resident Visas are not foreigners per se as they have earned the right to be here. The crux of the issue is that the policy implies that Asians who buy houses are all “foreigners” stealing houses from Kiwis. Since the policy was announced a day ago, the majority of news articles have focused on race.

For me, the key to the success of this policy will hinge on the next few days. If Shearer can move the debate away from race and focus on hard, concise facts (i.e. “x” number of homes are sold to non-residents per year driving up the price by an average “of y” dollars per house), he may have a winner. Otherwise, this could cost Labour should the debate remain on race.

The crux of the issue is that the policy implies that Asians who buy houses are all “foreigners” stealing houses from Kiwis.

This policy does nothing of the sort. It is the media and opponents of the policy who are implying that. And I firmly believe that this approach will backfire on those using it – people will see Shearer saying that this policy is to stop foreign ownership of property. All foreigners. Not residents or citizens. Immigrants will also see TV3/Key/you saying that immigrants should be upset by this because they might be considered foreigners. But you see, the only people suggesting that they (the immigrants) are foreigners are TV3/Key/you, not Shearer, so it is TV3/Key/you who are racist, not the Labour Party, not the policy.

Perception is power. It is why National is losing the battle on the GCSB and Kim Dotcom. The early perception on this policy from the MSM is that this policy is aimed at Asians. And if by saying that means I’m racist in your eyes, then so be it.

The MSM was always going to portray this as an anti-Asian issue, simply because it is an easy way for them to “sell the story” plus those opposed to it always push that line.

But I don’t accept that the story portrayed by the MSM is an indication of how the issue is being perceived by people. While it can influence people’s thinking, people are still able to think for themselves, and can think past such obvious spin.

Anyway, MSM portrayal is an indication of public perception, surely National is winning on the GCSB and Kim Dotcom battle? Most of the media seem to be happy to portray the line that nothing is really wrong with the GCSB bill, and only pay lip service to those opposing the bill.

Holy fuck, I just saw the report on TV3 nightline. To call the editing “heavy” is insufficient, to say the least. Compare the length of the bites Shearer got versus Key. No idea what got cut out – do they put the full interviews online?

If key got that treatment, I reckon their comparative performance would be about even.

wtl the tag team trolls take turns at spieling the same boring propaganda word for word !
its goosemans turn to have break they send in another lot of clowns to take over!
just like pro wrestling its fake !

Yeah, I was remembering some of the hobbit posts which had a couple of hundred comments, half of which were by Gosman, but seems that these don’t really feature among the leading posts by comment number.

If you go to “posts” you can click on the labels across the top to sort by them. Annoying it sorts “79” as higher than “738” but there’s clearly nothing in the 800/900 range so I’d be surprised if there were anything in the 1000s.

The top is some maniac who put in a pile of pingbacks (which are stored as comments).

Update: Looking at shoving some more capacity at the server. Setting up for it now. We have been persistent on the webserver at about 50% CPU for a few hours now. Database is running at less than 20%. Any comments on what it feels like?

iprent is their any plans for an app for smart phones because trying to do anything like posting or reading it keeps cutting out and given nearly 60 % of kiwis are using smart phones it might be worth looking at!

There is a brand new version of the mobile code that I got before samoa that is meant to break up the comments and handle threading. Unfortunately it didn’t go straight in on the first attempt.

I’m aware of the problem – my low grade phone doesn’t like it either (HTC One V). I will clear some time to play with it outside normal hours. There is another one that looks pretty good as well.

There are a few app’s around. But most of them don’t like handling quite so many messages in threaded.

But I do start writing code for a android app next week (SDK damnit – would have preferred the NDK or HTML5). So I will be keeping an eye on it for how to use it. And I guess I could overcome my aversion to Apple’s ever changing Objective C frameworks.

It is odd. I logged in as AncientGeek as Editor and got the posts page with all posts as read only apart from my own (none). Looked at your capabilities against mine, and they were nearly identical – now they are identical.

Can you see the list of other authors posts? Be able to view the posts but not edit them? That is what you should be able to see in the list of posts – all 13053 items. Is there a filter on at the top?

80% of the countries with restrictions are poor, undemocratic and not the countries that NZ compares itself with on social or economic norms.

The countries with no restrictions are generally free in other areas.

Which club do you want to be in?

Policy making has a signalling effect. Make no mistake this policy would be signalling to our trading partners a direction of travel quite at odds with the last 20 years. If that is the case, Labour should be upfront about that, but Shearer is implying instead that we are changing policy to be “like everyone else”. Actually the proposal is to be like China and Australia.

Do we want to adopt China’s stance on border economic and people flows? No didn’t think folk here would like that.

So the cheerleaders here want to be like Australia. Really? Because Australia has such a good record at housing policies that work for the working class. Would you like to be a worker buying a house in Sydney or Melbourne? No didn’t think so.

The Standard cheerleaders have been sold a dog. So for the sake of the country please stop mindless cheerleading and look at some evidence. Otherwise you really are no better than a bunch of New Zealand First fucktards.

“80% of the countries with restrictions are poor, undemocratic and not the countries that NZ compares itself with on social or economic norms.[in the OECD]”

That is a very good point. It has been apparent for a long time that the ambitions of NZ pollies have been highly inflated and that their eyes fixed on the USA, UK, or Oz as exemplars. Of course it is inappropriate to have few ideas of our own, but we do want to keep up with the big boys and share their toys and secrets. And it seems that most pollies would sell most of us at knock-down prices to advance themselves with those glamorous beings from across the sea.

The “freedom” of the USA, the “wealthiest” country in the world….where almost 50m people are on food stamps, and 80% at some stage live near (or under) the poverty line, struggle with joblessness, or rely on benefits. No thanks.

Who curiously enough happen to be in strong trade agreements with us and are our first and second largest trading partners by a good margin. The next two USA and Japan together roughly equal China.

So who exactly should we be like? The US with its obsessive border controls, continuous wars, and a population running under extreme surveillance – not to mention a mortgage market that absolutely sucks.

Japan, a country that has been in permanent deflation for most of my life?

So ignorant fool. Are there any other totally obvious answers that you’d like to drag out of me. Or can you be safely trusted to start reading some actual data on you own rather than consulting a mythic view of an ancient and forgotten world?

If Labour wins the next election they will have a mandate for this change.

What pisses me off is that it is being portrayed as us joining a commonly applied policy stance internationally. The evidence I have posted shows this to be a lie. Shearer should issue a clarifying statement that refers to the countries in the world that we will be joining, and critically all of the OECD countries that we will be walking away from. Otherwise the electorate is being lied to.

Interesting that Denmark has the most unaffordable housing in Europe despite banning foreigners. Czech Republic is one of the most expensive too. They also both have capital gains taxes on residential property investment.

i do not have a problem with non-residents being shut out of speculating in the New Zealand housing market,

i do tho have some doubt about the beneficial effects of doing so as we are still allowing the neighbours from across the ditch to indulge,(correct me if i have read that wrong),

The problem i do see is that the buyers from places other than Aussie might have to a certain extent been out-bidding even them and we may find that by forbidding others while allowing the Aussies we have more of the Aussies bidding in the market by dint of them knowing that it is the Australians with the bigger bucks when compared to what NZ residents in many cases can afford…

Best price doesn’t always win. Freakonomics did a piece on this. They found people who were willing to wait often got better prices. Timing and sale conditions play a role. A lower price with no conditions can beat a higher one and a three month wait for settlement. My suspicion is foreign buyers are more prepared to settle sooner because they need certainty on finance and probably won’t have houses to sell first.

Great throwaway line there. Yet any policy should evaluate its unintended consequences. Consider how reliant we are on foreign capital. More often than not people choose to invest here precisely because of what New Zealand has to offer on top of the commercial benefit: lifestyle.

Investors very often get hooked on us with a holiday, which turns into a holday home in Wanaka or Queenstown or the Bay of Islands or Cambridge, which becomes a reasoned package with their decision to take a slice of the business they are acquiring.

A quick list of four gives an idea of the industries – and all jobs within them – that would be damaged if they were told by Labour to pack up and sell because they weren’t citizens:

We certainly don’t have to lilke them, and we can all shudder in our socialist boots, but we need them and the welcome mats that our holiday destinations provide. I generally like the new Labour policy. But I can easily see the streets of Wanaka and Queenstown turning bleak, boarded up and lonely for their vulnerability to this. And with those holiday homes goes major capital. Sorry, we can’t do without them.

You see, it is in fact very simple. The more capital there is chasing the limited assets in NZ the greater the value of those assets…

… means people have to spend more money to simply own the asset (i.e. ridiculous interest costs to banks ha ha, aint they laughing) rather than spending the money on income producing. A classic example of this of course is dairying…

… take a farm that makes, say, $100k net pa. It might require a young kiwi farmer to pay, say, $1M to buy (interest costs $90k pa, deposit required $300k). Now with the ridiculous demand being placed on farms by foreigners that young farmer now needs to spend $2M to buy (interest costs $180k pa, deposit required $600k)…

… so the young kiwi farmer instead gives up and works for the foreigner.

Genuinely, we do not need them to anything like the extent is made out. Most of them, and especially the likes of your list there, are solely interested in the lifestyle – business comes a distant second. Far easier to keep active and useful investing in other lands. Just keep a place in NZ for holidays, a farm for the green grass and mountain backdrop, and a bolthole for when the world melts down. Meantime, all asset values get driven up. High asset values are only of use to the merry-go-round Ponzi scheme banking system – nobody else.

I don’t think the Government does know how many crims are buying houses, but I agree that it stands to reason that many overseas based buyers of NZ houses are crinminals – or at least some. Stopping these purchases could be a is a useful part of the war on drugs. As you know I am sceptical that it will bring down house price inflaion, but if it reduces crime, it is probably worth a try.

A huge error of judgement by the Labour Party that will backfire. The polls will hardly improve and this will only cause more unease among the leadership.
It will cost David Shearer the leadership. Robertson to the fore. Time for him to step up.